Beyond Armageddon V: Fusion (58 page)

“I can’t…”

“You must! Armand and the others are dying. Send them help, Jorgie.”

The mention of Armand’s name grabbed JB’s attention. No doubt the thought of the gallant Frenchman—someone Jorgie had grown to admire—gave him one last burst of energy.

Trevor saw the scene change to a place he could not identify; an industrial town situated beneath a row of beautiful, towering mountains covered with green and surrounded by serene rolling hills. A formation of soldiers marched along a road outside of town, enjoying the sun of a gorgeous Russian summer day as well as a postcard view.

Trevor realized—Satka, Russia. This place. This very place before the infection of Voggoth came and tore it asunder.

Alexander stood at the open passenger’s door of a Sherpa military vehicle. He used a small flashlight to consult the map unfolded on the seat therein. A Royal Marine watched over the leader with his eyes aimed east at the battlefield raging just below the nearby ridge.

Explosions of red and orange—barrel flashes—streams of fire—and vehicle headlights created a shifting tapestry of light within the mass of combatants. The occasional lightning flash from the cloud-covered heavens revealed a morass of human fighters in close-quarters battle with the alien horde. A smoky haze floated above the slaughter.

Behind Alexander the crews for a pair of small artillery pieces hurriedly hitched their guns to transports. Other workers packed crates with gear and sealed them shut.

Armand’s motor bike roared to a stop near the Sherpa. The warrior—a big blood stain on one thigh and a slash cut through the leather sleeve of his outfit—knocked the stand into position with a sharp, frustrated kick. As he approached Alexander he removed his helmet.

“What did you want me for?”

Alexander answered, “Round up your cavalry. I need you to cover our retreat.”

“Retreat?” Armand’s face twisted in disgust as if Alexander had just cursed a dear relative. “Trevor and his son are still inside that temple.”

“I know. I am not happy about this. But the battle has turned against us. Too many of those things coming out of thin air. Already our northern flank has collapsed. As it stands, we may have to leave our wounded behind.”

“Alexander, I have followed you for years without question. Your pragmatism kept us alive and together during those early times. But I do not want to do this thing. If Trevor is right, then this is a battle that must be won. Sometimes it is best to take a chance, even when the odds are against you.”

Alexander shook his head not in disagreement but surprise.

“I did not know you had come to trust him so.”

Armand answered, “He has been right since the moment he came here. I cannot ignore that. And neither should you. We must stay and fight.”

“If we do not leave soon then we may not be able to disengage! Do you know what that means? We will be overrun and cut to pieces. Right now we are a wounded army, but we are still an
army.
With cover from your riders we can retreat. Soon we will not even have that luxury. The lines of this battle are already disintegrating. Please, Armand, I do not like to—“

“Come!” a shout interrupted Alexander’s argument. “Alexander! Armand! Come and see!”

The voice belonged to the lanky black man named Gaston. The one who had been spying in France for Russian intelligence at the time of the invasion. He stood at the edge of the dead orchard waving frantically.

Both Armand and Alexander knew Gaston not to be a man easily taken to shouting. They reacted by dropping everything and walked quickly toward Gaston. Alexander’s bodyguard joined the group and they pushed through the forest.

“What is it?” Alexander felt time—and a chance to escape—slipping away with every wasted second.

Gaston said, “It is unbelievable. A miracle.”

After the field of dead trees came a small, round valley, the valley they had inspected prior to the battle: the field full of the tanks, guns, equipment, and uniforms of the 276
^th
Motorized Rifle Regiment.

Alexander and Armand stopped at the edge of the orchard. And gaped.

The T-72s, the mobile artillery, the BTRs and the boxes and crates of equipment and ammunition remained. However, hundreds—perhaps thousands—of green blobs the size of coffins now filled the space between the gear.

Rick Hauser and several of Gaston’s men worked among the strange blobs, digging into and peeling away layers of what resembled hardened gelatin. Dozens of strangers stood among them. Alexander squinted as if to ensure his vision worked properly. A bolt of lightning lit the scene and confirmed what he thought he saw: those strangers were naked men.

“We started pulling them out as soon as we found them,” Gaston explained. “They are alive! We focused on freeing the officers. With a little searching they should find their uniforms.” He considered then added. “I suppose any uniform will do for the time being. It is cold, no?”

“I do not understand,” Alexander said. “Who are they?”

By the tone in Armand’s voice it seemed he understood and accepted the situation: “You see, they are alive. Trevor and his son are alive. They did this! They turned Voggoth’s trick and used it to help us. We must keep fighting, Alexander. These men will turn the battle.”

Alexander wanted to say something to Armand, but the Frenchman hurried away from his side and wade among the newcomers, smiling in a fashion Alexander had rarely seen from his friend.

For their part, the naked men huddled in small groups taking pains to shield themselves in modesty and from the cold air under the cloud-filled night. A few realized their clothing lay nearby and scrambled into uniform. Shock, however, stymied the majority.

Armand aimed to change that. He hurried to the nearest T-72; a dust-covered dinosaur on the verge of resurrection. Gaston realized Armand’s intentions and stood at the base of the vehicle, translating his words.

Despite the sounds of battle from a half-mile away, one burst from Armand’s FAMAS rifle into the air grabbed the attention of the liberated soldiers. A line of naked Russians stood in front of the tank; more spread across the field.

“Listen to me,” he yelled and as he did, Gaston repeated the words in Russian. “You do not know what is going on. I understand. The short way to put it is that you have traveled through time; about eleven years. In that time, Earth has been invaded and we are at war for our survival.”

Armand tried to summon some kind of inspirational speech. He tried to capsulate lots of information into a few sentences as clearly as possible. Alas, the Russian soldiers were neither inspired nor enlightened by his words.

Armand chose a different approach.

“Okay, then let me just put it like this. Now is the time to fight…”

He threw his arm behind him and pointed toward the sounds of battle.

“…and those are the bad guys.”

Jorgie fell to a knee. The energy field buzzing around him flickered. The Nyx seemed to wriggle free of their prison but only for a split second before something stopped them dead again.

Trevor stepped forward but the electricity kept him away as surely as it kept the cloud-things held in place.

“They’re coming, Father. I felt another door open.”

Trevor saw—shapes forming in the energy stream around Jorgie.

Although worn to the point of exhaustion, Trevor heard a measure of awe in his son’s voice as he mumbled, “Something is happening to me—I am seeing things—I feel different.”

Higher up, toward the dark ceiling, the images in the energy screen changed. The cities of yesterday—the battlefield outside the temple—they disappeared replaced by a spinning red funnel that tugged at the power generated by the Nyx.

“I can’t control it any longer.”

At that moment his grip on the energy field ended. The inky-black Nyx creatures became free and threatened to envelope the boy and his father. But at the last moment the pull from the red funnel overcame the strength of the creatures.

Trevor thought he heard a scream—perhaps only in his mind—as the open door in the energy field sucked the creatures up and in. The spinning red vortex sealed shut.

Energy still crackled around Jorgie, filling the Temple with a soft glow. Voggoth and the Nyx had both been sent away to whatever realms they hailed from. But Trevor realized—something else had come through.

They were not alone.

24. The Eight

JB remained on one knee, still surrounded by sparkles of light. Trevor saw his son taking deep, exhausted breaths.

“Jorgie—Jorgie, are you—are you okay?”

JB’s eyes appeared to be watching something; something Trevor could not see.

“Father, I see now. I understand. This wasn’t supposed to happen like this. I am— am becoming whole again—Father I’m very tired.”

JB placed a hand to his forehead.

Trevor took a step forward—and stopped.

They materialized from the glittering energy field like ghosts taking physical form. Trevor realized that the door through space and time his son had commandeered from Voggoth remained open. But open to where?

The light dimmed in the slightest but still surrounded the players on center stage. The sour stench of Voggoth’s earthly lair faded; the feeling of swirling energy calmed.

The newcomers gave JB—still exhausted; still kneeling—a glance before drifting into a circle around Trevor. Their hands—the hands of children—reached and touched his skin as if ensuring the reality of his existence.

He eyed each of the six one by one. A Hivvan, a Duass. A Witiko without a trace of silver cosmetic. A Centurian with big black eyes; a Geryon lacking the leather armor Trevor had seen his people wear on the parallel Earth.

Trevor saw a familiar face as the hands stopped reaching and the children retreated into a ring round him. He dropped to a knee and greeted the Chaktaw girl—Alenna—at eye level, with a smile.

She returned his smile as she asked, “Do you know who we are? Do you know what we are?”

Trevor sighed as he replied, “You are an advanced evolution of each of your races. Probably from some—from some original universe. Did you create the eight parallel universes?”

The Hivvan boy said, “The original universe is older than you can imagine. Its creation resulted in echoes of itself; empty echoes. Identical but lacking in sentient life.”

“Like rings in water after a pebble has been dropped in a puddle,” the Duass spoke through a short bill.

The Geryon added, “An infinite number of echoes. You are aware of only eight because we chose to create bridges between only those eight.”

“And in the original universe,” Trevor’s words felt heavy on his lips. Heavy with disappointment. “In it, eight races. But an empty Earth. Humanity sprung to life on Sirius. The rest—each of you—on your own home worlds. And you evolved there, for eons.”

“Yes,” the Centurian confirmed. “Our races are far older than you can comprehend.”

The others added their voices one after another.

“We grew beyond the physical.”

“Our minds evolved.”

“A synergy of matter and energy; the energy of our intellect.”

“Our technology advanced in ways you would be unable to grasp, but our beings advanced even further.”

Trevor held his hands aloft and cringed as he filled in many of the blanks for himself, wishing with each word he were wrong but knowing otherwise.

“So you accessed a universe for each race, seeding the planets to mimic what your universe was like in the beginning. Each universe identical in almost every way, except for one way. Mankind living on Sirius in each, except for one. In one you moved my people here, to this Earth. You did the same for each of the races in one of the universes. I don’t understand. Why?”

The Witiko sneered as if the reason should be obvious to any creature of intelligence, “To maintain identical conditions. To ensure equality in the test.”

“Test? So, what—Earth offered an environment suitable for each of the races. You erased any advantages of position or geography or weather or anything you couldn’t control, and found equal ground. Seems like a lot of trouble to go through just to kill each other off.”

“You see, I told you he could not understand,” the Duass said.

“He is unable to grasp the complexities,” the Geryon admitted.

The Witiko grumbled a tirade, “There is no reason to share this information. His understanding is irrelevant. Contamination has occurred here, resulting in our reunification which was something to be avoided until the end of the challenge.”

Alenna spoke, “We must deal with the changing circumstances. The use of the parallel cosmos’ was intended to prevent such contamination. His actions here were a surprise. Our planning did not consider this possibility.”

“You screwed up.” Trevor voiced his accusation in a soft tone, but they reacted as if thunder had burst in their ears. Their eyes grew wide. Their children’s faces twisted into expressions of offense.

“You made a mistake,” Trevor repeated and found satisfaction in making them speechless. “Congratulations. It shows you’re human. Or, I guess, it shows you’re just people, just like me.”