The Glooming (Wrath of the Old Gods Book 1) (15 page)

Tara bit her lip. “Look, I’d rather take my chances with him for now.”

“Okay,” the dog said. “This is your choice after all.”

“What do you want me to do then?” Tara said as she could hear the sounds of glass breaking and an alarm ringing across the parking lot.

“I cannot decide your path. Only you can do that,” the dog said.

“He seems nice to me and I owe him since we ate some of his food, you know,” Tara said.

“All men are not what they seem. It may take some time for someone to reveal his true self,” the dog said.

“What does that even mean? Could you stop talking in riddles?”

“The pattern is not yet clear. The lines are still being drawn.”

“You’re just not making any sense anymore.”

“To know what you know and what you do not know, that is truly knowing yourself.”

“Jeez! You. Are. Not. Making. Any. Sense!”

“Who are you talking to there?” Larry said as he threw the tools in the back of the van along with another box before closing the rear doors.

Tara looked in the rearview mirror and shook her head. “Nobody, just talking to myself.”

Larry walked over to the driver’s side and opened the door. “Okay, I didn’t find much other than a little cash on the registers, I dunno if money is of any use these days, but it doesn’t hurt if we have a bit of it.”

Tara turned and looked at him. “Did you really have to do that? It’s stealing.”

Larry just smiled and shook his head as he got in the driver’s seat. “Sweetpea, the owners of those stores have pretty much abandoned them or they’re probably dead. The world that you know is over. There’s new rules now if you wanna live. You still with me?”

Tara looked down at the flooring of the car. She didn’t like it but it seemed she didn’t have a choice. “Yeah, let’s go,” she said as she closed the front passenger door.

Larry placed a hand on her lap as he started the van’s engine. “That’s the spirit!”

London

He was in a sea of fire. All around him were burning waters. There were people trying to climb up on his little wooden boat while their bodies were aflame, screaming in pain and pleading for help, but he was tasked by the gods to only observe. As he looked down into the black depths, he could see the drowned, but their bodies were burning even though they were underwater. He knew he was either in a dream or a vision of some unfathomable future. It was some strange netherworld, a place where the dead of eons past would go to be reborn once again. But it was also a place of pain and suffering. Was it a vision of Hell or a glimpse into the future of the world? His own self was transparent as he looked at his hands as he held them in front of his face. But they were ghost-like as his limbs looked more like translucent mist than actual flesh; he could see right through them as if they were almost invisible. He could feel himself lighter than air as the winds carried him from the boat and into the mist-laden sky, filled with bolts of white lightning and thick clouds. He was traveling, moving across time and space and into some sort of astral dimension, yet he was somehow grounded on earth. He had a feeling of being buffeted by angry winds as he could see screaming people of all sorts being trapped in the clouds. Tornadoes would sweep in and carry them to and fro from one part of the sky to another, their constant thrashings and screaming were deemed both utterly useless and endless. He could see himself passing over a deep, dark forest of black branched trees, with crawling, squirming things on their bark that seemed like they were part of it all. Looking down at the pale forest, he could see creatures of the woods, walking around; prancing and dancing beneath the shadowy canopies, their shrill cries were like the whisper of insects. On and on he went until he flew over the base of a strange mountain. It was dominated by a pyramidal structure of a giant stone ziggurat, with massive granite steps leading up into the dark heavens. He could feel the winds pulling him upwards until he reached the summit, whereupon he spied on three monstrous beings sitting on thrones made of human bones beside a carved stone table. The first being seemed to be a living skeleton, its bony ribcage visible underneath its cloak of brightly-colored feathers, its corpse-like visage had huge, saucer-shaped eyes and long fangs that belied its malevolent nature. The second creature seemed like a hairless man, but with long antlers growing out of his forehead, his deep black skin seemed to swallow light and his blank face had neither eyes, nor nose nor mouth; nothing but a dark void of entropy as he held a gigantic, wriggling maggot in his right hand. The third being was the most inhuman of all, it seemed more like a wisp of energy that took on a vaguely human form crossed with that of a celestial worm; a screaming, white hot spirit of destruction and desolation. On the stone table were strewn about several small amulets that resembled either men or beasts: a figure of a knight, the statue of a woman holding aloft two snakes, as well as small trinkets that resembled a raven and a little dog, among many others. The three players were presiding over what looked like a game of chance, with the world as the prize. It was then that he heard voices that seemed to call him back to the world of the living and the soon to be dead.

After what seemed to be an eternity, Dr. Paul Dane opened his eyes. As his vision and mind began to focus, he noticed that he was lying on a bed. The room was stark white and had an antiseptic smell. An intravenous needle was stuck in his arm. He felt pain all over his body and especially his head and chest. His left arm was free and he rubbed it gingerly on his forehead as he groaned.

A young man in a grey suit sitting in a chair on the side of the room immediately turned off the laptop he was typing in, folded it, and then ran out through the open door, shouting at the top of his lungs the patient was finally awake. Paul groaned again and closed his eyes as the migraine overwhelmed him. When he opened them again a few minutes after the headache had passed, he noticed the grey-suited man was now standing over him, along with an older man with pale skin, slick black hair and wearing a dark suit while a middle-aged female nurse in her white uniform was checking his arm and feeling his head.

The man in the black suit cleared his throat. “Professor Dane? My name is David Getz, I’m with the State Department. With me is Greg Gover, he’s with the embassy. Can you talk?”

The nurse frowned at the other two. “This man has been drifting in and out of consciousness for the past three days, he needs some rest,” she said.

Getz looked at her. “I’m sorry, ma’am, but this is a national emergency. I need the patient up on his feet because we need to go right now.”

The nurse crossed her arms. “Only the doctor assigned to him can decide whether he can be released or not. Those are the rules.”

Gover pulled out a document from his coat pocket and waved it in front of her. “I’m sorry, nurse, but we have a signed executive order from the president of the United States that clearly says that this man needs to be transported back to America, and right away.”

The nurse started to walk out of the room. “I’ll need to clear it with the administration first.”

“Do that,” Getz said to the nurse as she walked out before looking at Gover. “Follow her and get the clearance, then alert the extraction team. We need to leave now.”

“Okay,” Gover said as he too left the room. The corridor outside was very noisy with shouts and the squeaks of hospital wheels all around them. People of all sorts were passing by the outside corridor, their faces gripped by concentration and concern.

Paul’s mouth was painful and sticky. “I … need water.”

Getz went over to a nearby table and poured some water from a pitcher into a plastic cup and then handed it to him. “You’re in a hospital in Knightsbridge. The situation is critical; we need to get out of here right now. We debated about just wheeling you out of here in your bed so thank God you woke up.”

Paul took short sips. “How long have I been out?”

“Almost four days now. You’ve had a concussion and some bruised ribs, but you’ve been barely conscious. You’ve been having fits and occasional delirium and you needed to be restrained quite a few times from what I heard.”

Paul looked at him. “Sir Wilfred? Megan?”

Getz shook his head. “I’m afraid Mr. Pyles is gone, he died of a broken neck from the car crash. Megan Abramson is still listed as missing.”

Paul moaned. He wanted to cry but no tears came. “What happened? How did you find me?”

“We found you in the wrecked police car just a few miles from Stonehenge. You were extremely lucky the rescue crews found you just minutes after you crashed. Because as soon as they pulled you out and brought you to London, we lost contact with everyone within a three-mile radius of that area. The Brits sent in army troops from nearby, but they went missing too. After that, the government tried to cordon off a ten-mile perimeter, but it didn’t hold. A blanket of fog settled into the entire area the next morning and then things just got worse. UK Third Army Division based in Bulford was reported to be under attack just two days ago by unknown assailants, and then all communications with them fell silent. Just yesterday that blanket of fog reached Heathrow Airport and now we think it’s lost as well. Whatever it is, it’s coming this way. London is being evacuated, but with the traffic jams, I’ve had to call the embassy for an airborne extraction because there’s no way we can get out of here by car,” Getz said.

Paul blinked several times. The situation was all too unreal. “News back home?”

“Not any better. No more commercial flights over US airspace, several dams have burst, including Hoover and a whole bunch of others over the past two days, and that’s just about killed power and water over most of the cities back home … not to mention hundreds of thousands now reported dead or missing. Massive storms and floods all over the East Coast and the South, the country is slowly being cut up into little pieces. The president and congress declared a state of emergency, but I doubt that will do anything. With most of our military in the Middle East and Afghanistan, law and order is starting to break down because the cops and what remains of the National Guard are too few to deal with this. Satellite communications are all gone and the internet only works some of the time.”

Paul coughed dryly as he was given another cup of water. “Other countries?”

Getz sighed. “Ireland we lost contact with days ago … the entire island is presumed lost to whatever it is that’s attacking. Most of Western Europe is under emergency rule but with the riots and such I doubt they will last long either. The British government has already evacuated to Scotland though it seems trouble is brewing up there too. It doesn’t look like anywhere is safe. Scandinavia has been snowed under and Russia isn’t talking, but our intel shows they might have lost Siberia to unknown forces. China is under total lockdown, but our intel reports are saying that the government there is also losing control too. Japan is under attack by unknown forces and the rest of Asia isn’t doing so well either. We have no idea what’s going on in Africa because of other priorities. Major parts of India are said to have been taken over by what we don’t know and whatever started in Iraq has spread to Turkey, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, and Iran. The Israelis are contemplating a nationwide evacuation, but where they could go beats the heck out of me because Egypt has also gone dark on us. The UN has tried to call an emergency summit for all its members, but everybody is too preoccupied with their own problems to even think about participating.”

“Why am I so important, Mr. Getz?” Paul said softly. “I’m just an anthropology and mythology instructor at a university.”

Getz pulled out a smart phone from his coat, queued up a video on it and showed it to him. “What do you think of this? This was a video taken in Bulford when unknown forces attacked and it reached us just before the army units there were cut off.”

Paul took a look. The video was grainy, probably from a handheld camera or mobile phone. It showed a group of fully-armed and equipped British soldiers manning a roadside checkpoint. There were sandbag barricades put up near the road and a machinegun team on the ready. As the point of view shifted to what lay beyond the road ahead, it seemed to show only an area covered by dense fog, as if it was some sort of smokescreen that slowly drifted towards them. As the video continued, Paul could suddenly see shapes forming at the edges of the fog and it looked like they were getting closer. Shouts from the soldiers in the video started as they were calling in for reinforcements as well as warning the unknown figures up ahead to turn back lest they come under fire. As another minute passed, the shadowy forms ahead began to take shape. Although they looked human at first, it seemed that they were misshapen. Some had one arm bigger than the other, while others had some sort of shambling gait as they lurched forward. When the enemy faces became clear it was apparent that they were not human. Some in the horde that slowly advanced on them had but a single eye set on their foreheads, others had multiple eyes but with only one or two limbs while a few more were naked with skin as if made of stone. Quite a few others had fanged mouths while a couple had snakelike lower bodies that slithered forward instead of walking to them, and a few others looked like red-skinned, pointy-eared dwarfs with claws instead of hands. It was an army of deformed, monster-like creatures and giants that first moved slowly but as soon as they could be seen clearly, the demons began to advance rapidly onto the startled squad. The video began to lose focus as the soldiers shouted and screamed while firing their weapons until it ended in a snowy haze of white static.

Paul opened his mouth in shock and then after a few minutes, his head collapsed back into the pillow on his bed. He placed his hand over his eyes and let out a low moan. The impossible had just happened. His life and the world would never be the same again. Everything he believed in, everything that he thought was real, was not.

Getz remained impassive, his face a mask of stone. “What were those things?”