Abney Park's The Wrath Of Fate (28 page)

BEAUTIFUL DECLINE

Our wrists were in cuffs, and the cuffs were locked to the arms of chairs, but the chairs were very posh. Polished, light tan leather cushions, backs and arms, with gorgeously sculpted aluminum frames. This theme of tan leather and aluminum was carried on throughout this massive cabin; bare rivets hand-bolted brushed aluminum panels to wall and floors, which surrounded the portholes, which were as big as bay windows.

Out this ample view we could see the tree tops of a vast jungle, the tallest trees stabbing gold in the early dawn light. Little wisps of morning fog streaked across the leafy jungle canopy, and were so serene and beautiful it was hard to remember our dire position. I couldn’t help think of the harsh and ironic assessment an older Calgori would be making of our surroundings at this time. “Leather?” he would have said, with a disapproving raise of the eyebrow. “The king of the beasts has leather chairs?” This ten-year-younger Calgori was much more mild than he would become, or at least he could keep his mouth shut better. Calgori’s mind seemed elsewhere, probably still working out the geometry of some creature or device he had been building in his lab.

Outside, to our left and right, were smaller, more heavily armed airships. These were the size of the
Ophelia,
and bristling with guns. Not the heavy iron cannon that served us so well, but a variety of more modern weapons; sleek cannon, machine gun turrets, and something that resembled depth charges. This high-tech weaponry was closer to what I might have seen on a warship from my own time.

These crafts had a 1930s flair to them. They were obviously handmade, but made with great skill. They were chrome, aluminum, and rivets in gorgeous sleek lines of luxurious Art Deco. There was nothing Victorian about Victor’s personal guard.

Our room was at the front of the massive gondola, I assume one floor below the bridge, so we could see directly in front of the enormous zeppelin. In the distance the pale yellow sun rose over a paler blue coastline, and at this point the jungle cleared to reveal a sprawling, ancient, ruined city. Vines had swallowed these tan-stone Mayan ruins, and huge trees hung over the outer walls. Every one hundred feet around the wall and throughout the city were towers of sculpted steel girders similar in construction to the Eiffel tower, although considerably smaller, and topped with massive copper spheres. At fifteen second intervals these spheres would simultaneously burst in lighting bolts that, from this distance, looked like a blue web of light in a geometric dome over the ancient ruined city. This array of tesla towers was obviously a deterrent, a shield against airships, should any sky people feel like they wanted an end to the Emperor’s reign. I have to say it would be an effective deterrent. I sure as hell wouldn’t try to drop my big flammable balloon through this glowing web of lightening!

“Approaching Tulum city,” said a crackling female voice over the intercom. I learned much later that Tulum was an Mayan City that had stood on cliffs over looking the Caribbean sea since the thirteenth Century.

The towers near us stopped flashing just before our airships came within range. They turned off a few towers in the middle, creating a perfect channel down the center for us to fly. It reminded me a bit of an old film, wherein a very Hollywood-handsome Moses parted the Red Sea.

The sky was now pink fading to pale blue, a beautiful Caribbean morning. Over the quiet engines I could hear the emerald blue surf pounding on the white powder sand. The two airship destroyers held back, as our giant luxury ship slipped silently to the ground. We set down on beautiful grasses, where grazed the greatest variety of flawlessly healthy beasts I had ever seen. Zebra, giraffe, ostrich, llama, tapir, something similar to a giant armadillo, those stupid elelopes that nearly got me killed on the plains, and a hundred other beautiful and exotic beasts strolled through the gorgeously tailored lawns of this ancient city. It was a perfect Eden for a world emperor.

Guards now entered the cabin. They went straight to our chairs, and uncuffed us. “We are very sorry to have locked you up this entire trip, but you would not have come willing. Please refrain from anything impolite until you have met and spoken with the Emperor. We feel confident that you will not feel the need for violence once you have.”

Was this supposed to put me at ease, or creep me out? It mostly did the latter. What was he going to do, hypnotize me?

They walked us down the gangplank to the lush lawn, and at this time I saw a lone figure walking down the massive front steps of what must have been the main palace. I’m not sure what I expected the Emperor to look like, but this was definitely not it. A tall, muscular man in his late forties, tan with sun bleached hair was walking cheerfully towards us. He was shirtless but wearing a gorgeous black Armani suit of very Twenty-First century styling, and his tan bare feet stepped lightly from the old stone steps of the palace to the lush green grass of the lawns. Had he been younger, he could have easily been a model, but now his deep smile lines, and crows feet gave him the look of a very attractive movie star nearing an early retirement.

He had a huge smile, sparkling green eyes, and he jogged up to me enthusiastically. “I am so very
very
glade to meet you!” he said with genuine enthusiasm, as he grabbed my hand and shook it. “I have dreamed of meeting you for years, and hoped you would one day step into my time! Hopefully, I can set your mind at ease quickly, so that we may spend many days comfortably exchanging stories from our travels.”

I stared at him perplexed. “Okay. My name is Robert.” The Emperor smiled at my name as if telling him my name was a clever joke. I continued, “Nice to meet you.” This felt like make-believe, but I was going through the motions to see what would happen next. “Oh, and this is Doctor Calgori?” This last I said more as a question, since it was growing apparent he knew very well who we were. As I introduced Calgori, I could see the doctor’s face glowing red with rage. He had obviously seen too much of the oppression of the cities to have his forgiveness bought with a pleasant smile from a charismatic man. But if the Emperor noticed his anger, he didn’t show it.

“Come with me to breakfast, and we will talk! I will answer all your questions, in exchange for a few good stories from your travels, and thus we will spend a wonderful day together!”

Not seeing many options, since there were the massive, turbaned Imperial guards everywhere, and starting to feel a bit peckish, I followed him across the lawn toward the beach. Between the ruined, vine covered temples, were gorgeous, huge topiaries. All kinds of beasts, both real, extinct, and imaginary, had been rendered in these beautiful gardens, and among them strode the very real menagerie, looking just as fanciful.

There were also two large mausoleums of much newer construction than the city around us. Over the door of each were the names Emperor Victor Joseph Hippocrates the First, and Emperor Victor Joseph Hippocrates the Second. The Emperor turned to me and smiled. “A ruse, of course. It’s always been me throughout the years, as I’m sure you’ve now guessed. I travel back and forward through time setting plans in motion to create this Eden you have been enjoying. Much like yourselves!” he added with a smile.

“Eden!” Calgori growled under his furrowed brow, but the Emperor either did not hear or chose to ignore him.

“I didn’t want my people to think me some strange immortal creature,” the Emperor continued. “So I have faked my death several times, and posed as my own son and now grandson as needed. I chose this city because it has been unchanged since the Thirteenth Century. If you wanted to make your home in a place that would never change, no matter what time you traveled to, this is an excellent spot. Very clever of me,” he said with a sparkle which was meant that he wanted us to know he was joking when he patted himself on the back.

“I had furniture constructed of the highest, most long lasting quality and placed it here long ago. Now my rooms stay nearly unchanged no matter what time I travel to!” He grinned smugly. “Of course, if you travel too far back in time you have to deal with the city’s previous occupants, as I once learned. Not a pretty bunch, those Mayans, I barely survived the meeting. Still, it gives me nearly a thousand years to work with, and believe me you can accomplish a lot with a thousand years of non-linear time to play back and forth in. I have staff in most eras of the last few centuries, and they await my appearance to take my commands and execute them.”

As we walked, the palace and the sea were to our right, and to our left I could see a massive and gorgeously adorned hot air balloon being inflated. The gondola was sitting on a pedestal between topiaries, and attached to it was one of the glass orbs from the
Ophelia’s
Chrononautilus! On the side of the gondola was an anchor and spool. This was obviously how the Emperor managed his time travel, he’d go up in the balloon, jump through time, drop anchor and descend to nearly the same location but in a new era.

Soon the grass ended, and we stepped onto beautiful white powdered sand. Waves gently rolled onto the beach, and sleepily slipped back into the vast blue sea. In the middle of the sand was a tent of luxuriously ornate fabric, with decorative posts, golden ropes, and flags depicting the symbol of a deer eating a growing leaf. The sides of this tent were tapestries, and the scenes on them ranged from wildlife to what might have been illustrations from the
Kama Sutra’s
more advanced pages.

The Emperor turned back to us with a sly grin. “This will be a pleasure for us both! Allow me to introduce you to my wives!” We came around to the front of the tent, which was open to the sea. Inside was dark, but we could see silhouetted on the translucent cloth walls a huge bed on which were the almost pornographically shapely silhouettes of two women. They embraced and were kneeling on the bed between numerous tasseled pillows, kissing. When they noticed us, one of them leaped from the bed and ran to the Emperor. She was more flawless than a fashion model in her barely existent bikini and terra-cotta tanned skin. She looked at the Emperor doe-eyed, threw her arms around him and kissed him deeply.

When they had finished, he said, “This is the lovely Flora.” He took one of her hands off his shoulders and held it out to me to shake. She took my hand in her tiny one, and shook it without taking her eyes from the Emperor.

“Pleased to meet you,” I said. She said nothing, and her ice-blue eyes seemed to assess me unworthy of their gaze.

“Flora, now say hello to the Doctor. Without him, your wonderful life could never have been this luxurious,” said the Emperor, so Flora turned to him and said, “Then I thank you sincerely, Doctor.” She said this in a way that told us that she not only throughly enjoyed her life, but also throughly deserved it, and that she in no way truly credited the Doctor for her successful placement in Eden.

Then the other silhouette in the tent stood up, and with a slower, more purposeful stride walked toward the threshhold. Even before I could see her features, her pace and body language told me this was a woman, not a girl like Flora, and she was powerful and capable of great wrath.

The Emperor spoke again, “And here is my first wife, Fauna. Fauna is actually a nickname, as you will see. You know her by another name.” Out from the shadow of the tent into the bright morning sunlight stepped Lilith Tess.

Lilith was no longer a young child barely out of her teens, filled with an unquenchable desire to be noticed. This Lilith was a woman in her mid thirties. She walked with authority, and power. In her eyes was a fire I could not begin to guess the cause of. “It is good to see you again, Captain,” she said in an even tone that sounded neither sincere nor sarcastic. She glanced at the red rings the hand cuffs had left me, and said with a slightly victorious smile, “May I assume your trip was comfortable?”

“Lilith!” was all I said. I was flabbergasted. You’ll recognize the emotion; have you ever been having a really bad day, everything seeming against you, and right at the end of it when you felt your very lowest you run into your ex? That’s how I felt.