Beyond Armageddon V: Fusion (61 page)

“The human does not know this to be true.”

But Trevor did know it to be true. He recalled the words Anita Nehru had shared from her tomb deep within Red Rock. The final piece; the last truth. The ultimate truth. What she had discovered in that lair of horrors. The answer to the Fermi paradox.

“I ask again—how old is Voggoth? How old are the universes? Why are they so empty?”

“Voggoth,” Alenna repeated the answer provided previously, “is older than the universes. He predates our existence by uncounted millennia. His consciousness existed long before the first sparks of our life. We are the first to come since. Despite our age, we are still young.”

They stared at Trevor. He told them, “No. You are not the first. You are only the most recent. The next—the next
victims.
Look at the minions of Voggoth—look at the Mutants and the Wraiths. See what waits for you. See what became of all life before you!”

Silence. No reply.

“The universes are empty because the arrogant fools of races long past fell for the same trick. I wonder what words he whispered in their ears that convinced them to hand over their souls? I suspect those words sounded very much like what you’ve heard. It is the only way he reproduces. The only way his power expands. And you—you evolved superior beings—you have taken the bait again. It is not good enough to be so strong and so smart. You have to be
the
strongest and
the
smartest. Along the way you have handed your lives over to the darkness.”

Still, no replies.

“It may be too late. Voggoth has grown too powerful. While he himself is not allowed in the physical universe, he has built an army that mimics organic life. It grows. It devours. It infects with parasites, taking over my people and multiplying. Combined with his soulless armies, he is on the march here. Look close and you will see that his ‘token’ force is massive and nearly unstoppable. He will wipe us out and you will stand by and let him do it because we will be one less participant in your challenge. Even now what remains of your forces on my Earth converge to join Voggoth’s army to strike the last blow on humanity. And when he has destroyed my people he will move on to the next Earth, his ranks expanded with some warped version of mankind, circumventing the gates you control by using the Nyx directly—a back door he will exploit against us all. And soon he will no longer need your help to destroy one another. Soon what little reach he has into your universes will be enough. Then, just as he seems ready to do here, he will take over your bodies and swallow your souls!”

“Enough!”

“There is no reason to discuss the matter with one who cannot understand!”

“Fantasies and stories to save his people, nothing more.”

“We are superior. We can see through these fabrications.”

“We must leave! We must take the human surrogate and complete the reunification. No more time should be wasted in senseless discussion.”

Alenna stepped forward.

“Our time here is over. We must consider the effects of this contamination.”

The Duass spoke, “The interaction between your son and Voggoth changed everything. The reunification of our physical bodies and greater essence was reserved only for the victorious race.”

Trevor mumbled, “It is still not too late for you all to be victorious. The strong survive together. Division only serves Voggoth.”

But Trevor had barely the strength to mumble, nothing more. All of it had poured from his body. Exhaustion overtook not only his person but his mind.

The row of children retreated. Alenna hovered for a moment longer. She found Trevor’s eyes, smiled in sympathy for his plight, then followed the rest as they faded into the white light.

The children of the races departed.

Trevor turned his attention to JB.

His son staggered to his feet, having regained some control. The glimmer of light surrounding the area began to contract, forming a ring around the boy.

“I have to leave now.”

Trevor stepped closer but was held at bay by a field of power, like electricity—but not quite—around his son.

The stuffed animal—Bunny—wrapped in a blanket—lay on the dead floor of the temple. Trevor stooped, grabbed hold of the plush toy, and cradled it in his arms. He knew his son would no longer need it.

Trevor said with deep regret, “I know.”

JB tilted his head, blinked, and gazed at his father with curiosity and awe.

“I’m sorry, Father, that things turned out this way. I’m sorry you did not have a normal son, or a normal life.”

Trevor half-smiled and told his child, “It would have been nice to—to watch you grow up. To see you play little league and go to school. To see you meet someone, and start your own family. You’re missing so much of what it means to be human. You’re missing so much of life.”

“That would have been nice. But we all have our roles to play. Our parts. No one knows that better than you, Father.”

The energy began to circle around Jorgie; a growing funnel. Sparks of wondrous colors flickered like a rainbow of camera flashes.

Trevor tried one last time, “You have to tell them, JB. Tell them what life means. Share with them what they have forgotten, what you experienced. Tell them about a mother’s love. Tell them about how hard it is just living; just finding our way.”

Trevor bowed his head under the weight of the world placed on his shoulders. After a moment he blinked his eyes fast to stave off the sad, and honestly told his son, “I’m going to miss you.”

“Father, you have done your best—you always did what you thought was right. I know—I know what it has done to you. It has made you wonder what you’re really capable of. You wonder if you’re a hero or a monster. Maybe the difference between the two is not as great as it may have once seemed. But you need to know—for all you did—for everything you had to do—you are
forgiven.”

Trevor swallowed hard. His legs wobbled. The energy field sped faster and faster. JB’s face faded in the light. Trevor fell to a knee. The tears of a lifetime swept down his cheeks.

You are forgiven
.

A wind born from the circle of power swept through the chamber.

The boy disappeared in the flood of light. That flood rose toward the ceiling and expanded. The energy pushed against Voggoth’s walls and those walls crumbled.

Trevor wiped a hand across his face and watched the beam push through the ceiling and erupt into the night sky. He clutched the stuffed animal as tight as Jorgie ever had.

Debris fell, first small shards followed by larger chunks. The chamber grew unstable.

Trevor retreated a step, then two, then turned and jogged away.

The light faded, leaving behind a collapsing, empty shell of a building.

The fall of the temple accelerated as Trevor stooped and pushed through the hole in the front door. As he jumped down the stairs, the side walls collapsed inward and the twisted spires shriveled and fell into the growing pile of ruin. The boil-like smaller buildings withered.

Trevor stopped a few yards from the collapsing temple and took stock of the battlefield. Things had changed drastically since he had entered the building.

Bodies—of monsters and men—coated the black plain, in some places piled high like small mountains. Patches of fire burned here and there, primarily from the remains of motorcycles and vehicles although he also saw some giant snail-shell totally engulfed in flames.

He did his best to avoid stepping on bodies, but found that difficult. Some of those bodies still twitched and moaned; not all of them belonging to humans, either. Even when he managed to avoid stepping on a corpse his boots still slipped on the tools of battle: shell casings by the thousands; bits of shrapnel; shriveled tentacles and broken spears.

A tremendous shudder caused the ground to quake. Trevor spun his head around and watched the last standing temple wall fall. Sparks of arcane power danced along the edges of the pile, but the temple of Voggoth existed no more.

He shot his eyes to the sky and thought he glimpsed a sparkle of energy that might be the remains of his boy traveling off into the heavens. But Trevor quickly realized that he did not see energy but, rather, a star. An honest-to-god star: the thick cloud cover dissipated. No lightning remained.

BOOM.

He traced the source of the explosion to the northern end of the plain. There he saw a ring of iron—tanks and armored personnel carriers—tightening like a noose around a band of Voggoth’s monsters. Motorcycle cavalry circled the force like vultures waiting to dive in for easy pickings while squads of infantry—mainly Russian—filled the gaps between taking pot shots with rifles and tossing the occasional grenade. Above it all circled the Eurocopter adding its firepower to the mix.

Trevor allowed himself a sigh of relief. The ark-riding soldiers had turned the tide. Jorgie had fulfilled the time loop first begun eleven years ago and now complete. But in the end, what had he accomplished? A battle won. But the war lost.

Trevor’s sigh of relief morphed into a heavy pang in his heart. He had made the journey across the ocean, fought all the way from France to the Ural Mountains, banished Voggoth from Earth, and forced a confrontation with the powers of Armageddon. All that he could possibly have hoped for. Yet victory eluded his grasp.

A swarm of motorcycles worked around the bodies and drove to Trevor with a Renault Sherpa amidst the formation, squishing and crunching over the dead as it approached. The group halted as their headlights fell upon Trevor Stone.

Alexander bound from the vehicle with a smile from ear to ear. Armand jumped from his Ducati with an equally pleased expression.

“You did it, Trevor!” Alexander celebrated. “We have won the battle.”

Armand joined in, “It was you or JB who sent the Russians, yes?”

Trevor nodded his head, slowly.

“I could not believe it,” Alexander admitted. “I was ready to pull our forces away. We were being defeated. They just kept coming. And then the soldiers came. It made all the difference, Trevor. We won the day.”

The two stood there, beaming, with their chests heaving in and out with both excitement and exhaustion. Trevor, however, did not return their enthusiasm. He stood still, his head bowed.

Their smiles faded.

Alexander: “Where is your son?”

“He is gone.”

“I am sorry, Trevor,” Alexander consoled.

Armand, meanwhile, sensed more awry.

“Trevor, tell us, what happened? What did you accomplish?”

He raised his head.

“I accomplished nothing,” he told them. “They wouldn’t listen.”

25. Armageddon

Hell came to Quincy, Illinois. The inferno raged around Jon Brewer’s tenuous hard point along the banks of the Mississippi River. It raged in a hurricane of metal, fire, explosions, screams, and battle cries all beneath a tumultuous front of evil black clouds.

Glowing, lethal balls poured into the hardened city, dozens more with each passing minute. No structure remained standing along the waterfront; everything reduced to wreckage. Both bridges lay in the water, denied to the attackers.

Humanity’s defenders took refuge among the blasted buildings and toppled vehicles. Many of the prepared machine gun nests and gun emplacements remained, but just as many had been rooted out and destroyed by the invader’s barrage.

Mankind returned fire with fire. Hundreds of guns—large and small; mounted and dismounted—targeted the incoming projectiles with growing accuracy. Artillery shells fired from behind the lines managed to hit Voggoth’s army as it lurked more than a mile from shore waiting for the pummeling to pave the way.

Jon used his glasses to gauge the enemy. The tree line on the western dike that had obstructed his view of the opposing force just hours before was long-gone, replaced by a smoldering pile of toppled timber and hundreds of stubborn trunks of various sizes all warped and melted by the crossfire.

“Bragg, do you copy? Jimmy, come in!”

The constant roar of explosions and flying ordnance forced Jon to scream into his radio.

A barely audible voice responded, “Copy that. Give me targets.”

An exploding ball hit the pavement of Front Street in an eruption of concrete and dirt. The resulting fallout caused Jon to duck his head for the briefest of moments; even his determination must succumb to reflex.

The spotter Eagle had long ago been swept from the air, therefore target acquisition came from more conventional means.

“On your map,” Jon consulted his own as he estimated the target area, “in the fields west of CR-346. I count three batteries. The damn things are killing us.”

Captain Jimmy Bragg was a veteran of Five Armies, having been the first to spot the approaching Roachbots before the battle and then later his Apache had been knocked down by the Chaktaw at the same time as Nina’s.

As he had during that battle eleven years ago and throughout his career in Trevor’s army, Jimmy Bragg answered Jon’s call with a military stoicism that bellied the suicide mission he undertook: “Roger that, General. We’re heading in.”