Last God Standing (27 page)

“It is the last breath of human weakness. Their worst fears, their most petty prejudices. Hounded into the dark alleyways of the collective unconscious by time and reason, it is a part of them, as indivisible from their better qualities as night is from day. The human race finds itself at the same critical moment that has destroyed countless other races in the multiverse. They too have evolved, but not fast enough to escape their most primal fears. It is this fear upon which the Coming feeds. It is this fear, their greed and their avarice Embodied, that will define the next Aspect of God.”

Lando nodded. “Holiday.”

“Owen Holiday is but the messenger, empowered by the Coming in order to seduce a terrified humanity to his master’s service. He is Moses standing before the Red Sea with the Pharaoh’s soldiers hot on his sandals. Nice work, by the way.”

“Send me back, Ra,” Lando said. “You came through the black hole. You know the way back.”

“Have you remembered truly,
then?”

Lando studied the Creator God’s face, the strange duality of him; now a man, now a hawk surrounded by a golden corona of sunfire, now something else entirely, something that dwarfed them all, a shining luminescence. He squinted into that light, drawing its strength into himself, riding its calming clarity the way a surfer rides a powerful wave.

“I remember my life,” he said finally. “I remember my parents, my friends. I remember Surabhi. She…”

Died.

“She was my best friend, I wanted to spend my life with her, but I couldn’t tell her the truth. I was selfish, afraid she wouldn’t believe me. I had lied about… about that other life. I was afraid… I was…”

“Human.”

“The Coming… it murdered her. Murdered her family. I have to get back.”

“Many more will die if the Coming assumes your old office. For it contains within itself the end of Humanity’s long march up from the mud. It is the End of Reason, the triumph of madness. You may already be too late.”

“But you can help me.”

“You’ve spoken of your mortal life, Lando Cooper. I find it terribly interesting that you’ve neglected the rest.”

Lando shrugged. “It doesn’t seem real. Standing here, with you… I remember it, but it feels like… like…”

“Someone else’s story?”

Lando looked down at Herbert-Hasani. The boy reached out and took his hand.

“That other part of me... I know it was important, once, but it doesn’t seem to matter now.”

Amon-Ra considered this for a moment. When he spoke it was as if his voice infused the air.

“Once upon a time, there was an aboriginal tribe in the far northern sector of my world’s version of Australia. The
aowu’uk,
the Morning People. They were the last of that region’s
indigenous
peoples. Locked in a pre-industrial state of development, primitive by the standards of even your South American indigenous tribes, they were trapped between their ancient traditions and the
ever-encroaching modern world. When they hungered they went to a local river to beg their gods for fish. Sometimes the gods complied. But after thousands of years many of those gods grew bored. They summoned their priests among the
aowu’uk
and told them that they were on their own. Some of those gods left this dimension; some moved to Sydney.”

“What does this have to do with us?” Lando said.

“The Morning People simply
stopped.
Their gods had abandoned them. There was great depression among the
aowu’uk, suicides. Their lakes dried up, and their fish populations died out. Things looked bleak. Searching for an answer, one young priest meditated for seven days and seven nights. On the eighth day, he summoned the Morning People to the banks of their most sacred river. ‘Bring only your strongest nets,’ he told them. ‘And your sharpest
toaks.’
‘Why?’ they asked. ‘Because,’
the young priest said,
‘The gods have returned.’

“And lo! There was great rejoicing. The Morning People came in great numbers to the banks of the sacred river. They cast their nets upon the waters and saw, almost immediately, that those nets were filling up with more fish than they had seen in years; more fish than they could eat that day or even that week. The Morning People lay down their toaks and scrambled for their nets. ‘Take only what you need!’ the young priest said. ‘Remember the other Peoples upriver; and the small cities downriver. Take enough to feed the young, the ancients, and all those who cannot fish for themselves!’

“Afterward, there was much singing and thanking of the gods. Finally, the young priest stood and called for quiet. ‘I have deceived you!’ he cried. ‘The gods have not returned. They will
never
return!’ ‘Why did you lie?’ the People cried. ‘You have brought doom upon us!’ ‘But have you forgotten what happened earlier?’ the young priest cried. ‘You came here in belief, as children, and pulled sustenance from the waters. But now that you understand the truth,
you tremble and forecry a thousand dooms. Why do you tremble when the gods have given us a great gift?’ ‘What gift have they given us?’ the People cried. ‘They have abandoned us!’ ‘Ah but that is the gift of the gods,’ the young priest said. ‘They have left us to fend for ourselves!’

“Then the shaman commanded several powerful young priests. ‘Take one male child from its mother, and one old woman from her family, and bring them to me.’ When the young priests had brought the child and the ancient to the shaman, he bade them kneel before him. Taking one of the great longknives, he raised it high above his head and prepared to strike the crying child.

“When the people cried out, ‘Why? Why do you do this?’ the shaman replied, ‘The gods have left us, we know this to be the truth. They left us to care for this world, for this river and all the life it holds; to care for each other. We came here as children, but we have reached our childhood’s end. Now we are the adults. We can lie down and die, destroy each other to avoid the pain and uncertainty of life. The gods do not care, or are gone. They will not save us. We can destroy ourselves and end our suffering.

“‘Or we can create the world that we want.’

“And the Morning People remembered that, working together, they had pulled fish from the rivers, working together, they had created joy and bounty for all. Their need to survive despite the loss of their shepherds forced them to evolve, instantly, and in the blinking of an eye. When last I visited the region, many of the Morning People were fluent in Coptic, English and Cantonese. The priests lead cultural awareness tours through their protected ancestral lands. The young shaman is now a world-famous guest lecturer and adjunct professor at several major universities. The Morning People awaken to a dawn of their own creation every day.”

AmonRa opened his hands. Cupped in his palms lay hundreds of the yellow flower petals, their amber richness a deep contrast to his luminous brown skin, his crimson tunic. He bent his face to his palms and inhaled deeply.

“Human potential,”
he breathed.
“The young shaman understood that half the battle is getting the people’s attention. Once you’ve got it the question becomes: what
will you do with all that potential?”

“What about LC? What’ll happen when I go?”

AmonRa’s frown deepened.
“LC Cooper died during surgery. His soul was replaced. By you. That soul has fled, perhaps beyond my reach.”

“No!” Herbert-Hasani cried, wheeling on Lando. “You promised you’d give him back!”

Lando knelt until he was eye level with the boy.

“I remember, Hasa. Can you be brave for me? Just for a little longer?”

HerbertHasani stared through suspicious tears. But he nodded. “Yes.”

Lando turned back to AmonRa.

“You have to help us, Ra. I know what you can do if you choose to, and I won’t leave without your promise.”

“There are laws governing continuity,”
AmonRa said.
“Laws that bind me as much as they bound Yahweh back in your world. I cannot disregard those laws without grave consequences.”

“I’m here because of the actions of defunct gods, Ra. It’s a violation of the law that governs a God’s existence. That violation will have even graver consequences if it remains uncorrected.”

AmonRa’s eyes narrowed.
“Go on.”

“How many laws am I breaking just by being here? How many laws would I break if I stayed? If I had children. If I died here?”

“You would disrupt the continuity of two realities, consigning your world to the machinations of the Coming and derailing human evolution.”

“Right.”

“And you would do this for one lonely mortal boy?”

Lando looked into the sun god’s eyes. “I’ve steered the tides of continuity to conform to what I hoped was right.”

“But your agenda was ratified by the shifting moral imperatives thrust upon you by your worshippers. A mortal consensus.”

Herbert-Hasani gripped Lando’s hand harder.

“He’s my son, Ra,” Lando said, finally. “I made him a promise and I won’t break it. If I did that, nothing I do in my world will matter.”

AmonRa nodded, still humming to himself, as he communed with the yellow flowers. Then he tossed a handful of the yellow petals into the air. The petals drifted, caught on a sudden breeze, and scattered, their individual music flaring brightly before fading from view.

“You’ve given an old God much to consider, Lando Cooper. But Holiday and his cronies vanquished you. How will you defeat them now?”

“You have power, Ra. You could come with me. Help me.”

“Quite impossible, I’m afraid. I would encounter the same disenfranchisement that you do now. No god can be God in two continuities. As my power waned in your realm, and worship of my pantheon faded, they grew stronger in this one. My power is inextricably bound to the collective unconscious of this realm. I can offer you little more than my blessing.”

“Then just send me back. I’ll figure something out.”

The tall god smiled once more, his eyes shining like white fire against the darkening sky.

“That much at least lies within my power.”

Amon-Ra stretched forth his right hand. The music of the yellow flowers became a choir, a sussurus of celestial melody.

“I am Amon-Ra, Skyfather and Star Rider, Master of the Barque of a Million Years. The Hidden Fire suffuses my Secret thought.”

As he spoke, a pinpoint of light appeared in the air between them. Lando felt the air grow warmer as the pinpoint grew. At the same time, the sky darkened until it was replaced by millions of glowing pinpoints.

“Stars,” Herbert-Hasani breathed. “Those are stars!”

“My strength is the faculty of light, and the wisdom of life unending for a billion years. It endures even unto the furthest realm that light reaches. I sing the secret names of Time and laugh at the tales quasars tell: I can help you in your quest.”

The air was becoming unbearably warm, the burning globe growing larger with each passing second. The heat and blinding light were pulsing from the shining sphere. It rapidly dominated the horizon, blazing forth with such power that it threatened to drive the air from Lando’s lungs.

“It’s the sun! He’s bringing the sun to Earth!”

“No, child,”
Amon-Ra said.
“Nothing quite so dramatic. I’ve merely brought
us to the sun.”

And then they were in space, thousands of miles above the sun’s seething corona. Even here, the power of the blazing star was palpable through the transparent plane upon which they stood. Lando saw the outline of the platform carrying them across the sun, its surface shimmering, its light refracted through cascades like crystal clear water.

“We stand aboard the Barque of a Million Years. It was a gift from my brother Horus. Quite handy for this sort of thing. Especially with my personal energy stores at an ebb.”

“A spaceship!” Herbert-Hasani cried. “Omega Massive!”

“‘Spaceship’
would be inaccurate, boy. More like a personal conveyance with limitless options. Apollo had his chariot, Thor had his magic goats, I have the Barque. It assumes whatever shape I tell it to. We were standing within its protective aura the entire time.”

To their amazed stares he added,
“Oh, I had every intention of rescuing you. But the journey to the far side of the sun takes time, even at the speed of thought, and nothing passes the time like good theater. Ahhh there it is.”

The sun god pointed at a spot in space just a few yards away from their position: a trail of luminous particles lighting the darkness. The shining trail swept away from the Barque and into the blackness of space, extending for as far as Lando could see.

“The hammer of Thor is more than a devastating weapon,”
Amon-Ra said.
“It is capable of piercing the barriers between worlds as easily at it summons storms. Before your friend struck you, he used it to open a pathway into this dimension.”

Amon-Ra lifted his right index finger and drew a silverine line across the fabric of space. The glowing streak paralleled the shining trail.

“Your Satan detached your soul from your physical body and propelled it along the route you see there. It’s a colossal coincidence that the dimension he selected was inhabited, an even greater coincidence that your trajectory brought you close enough to the sun that I would sense your arrival. His attack should have killed you outright.”

“Kalashnikov,” Lando said. “He screwed up.”

“Perhaps the Coming was unable to accomplish your physical death,”
Amon-Ra said.
“But that seems unlikely given its growing power. It extinguished Zeus himself. Something even I was, regrettably, unable to do.”

“A coincidence,” Lando murmured.

“Indeed. One that bears closer scrutiny in calmer times.”

Herbert-Hasani was staring out at the tachyon trail, his face aglow in the wash of its spectral light. Lando saw the shimmer of the luminous trail reflected on the boy’s cheeks.