The Glooming (Wrath of the Old Gods Book 1) (21 page)

Boland kept going until he got to the door of the bunker. Two other MPs were there and as soon as they saw him they opened the door and let him through. As he walked into the entrance, he passed by a large communications room with several soldiers hunkered over their radios as they desperately tried to coordinate a defense of the city while trying to evacuate all important personnel. His Marine guide kept walking ahead of him and finally stopped in front of an interrogation room, then opened the door for him. As Boland walked into the smaller room, his mouth was open in mute shock.

Sitting beside the lone table was Patrick Gyle. His beard was scraggly and there was some hair growing at the top of his once bald head. Gyle’s right arm was in a makeshift sling and he could see dried blood over the improvised, dusty bandages on it. The rest of his tattered fatigues were caked with dust. Gyle was Boland’s operator and he was reported missing almost a week ago when the sandstorm first engulfed the northern regions of Iraq.

There were two other men in the room and Boland knew them as well. General Harry Sunderland was now the CO of all US forces in Baghdad and he was sitting across from Gyle, along with his aide, Major Benjamin Rawls. Both men barely acknowledged him as they continued to stare at Gyle, as if somehow waiting for a confession.

As the door closed behind him, Boland carefully walked over to Gyle and bent down slightly as he looked into the operator’s tired eyes. “G, what the hell happened? How did you get here?”

General Sunderland crossed his arms and frowned as he leaned back on his metal folding chair. “We haven’t been able to get a word out of him. My men found him near the outer perimeter of the Green Zone just half an hour ago. He was in a car with a dead Iraqi in the front seat.”

Gyle said nothing, his eyes just staring straight ahead into space.

“He’s wounded. Is there a medic?” Boland said to the two senior officers before turning back to face Gyle. “G, can you speak?”

“Medics are on the way,” Major Rawls said. “It could be PTSD.”

At that moment, the entire room shook for a few seconds, almost as if it was a small earthquake. The lights dimmed briefly before returning back to normal.

Gyle looked up into the concrete ceiling. “They’re here,” he whispered.

Boland turned to him. “What? Who’s here?”

The door opened and in came an Army captain who was the designated command C2 officer as General Sunderland turned to face him. “Sir, our security forces reported enemy contact at Baghdad airport, then they went off the air,” the captain said.

General Sutherland got up and made his way to the door before turning to Boland. “Make sure he tells us everything,” he said before walking out of the room.

“G, who are they?” Boland said as he looked at Gyle.

Gyle’s blue eyes had a glazed look. “We thought they weren’t real but then they just … appeared. I don’t think we’ve got a chance. We’ve got to get outta here but there’s nowhere to run to.”

Major Rawls leaned forward, elbows on the table. “Who are you referring to?”

“T-they were like winged monsters,” Gyle said wistfully. “Like those stone statues in the ruins. But they were alive.”

Confused, Major Rawls looked at Boland. “What in the hell is he talking about?”

Boland remembered the tour in the museum of antiquities in regards to the culture of the region. He had taken some lectures on it and read some books. Most of all, he remembered playing a pen and paper role-playing game back in his college days. In one gaming session that lasted all night to the following day, he and some others had created make-believe characters who delved into a dungeon filled with monsters that had to be killed in order to get their hands on the fabulous riches that lay within. In one particular room that was described to them by the game’s narrator, they encountered a creature with the body of a lion, but had the head of a man with giant wings that enabled it to somehow fly. The narrator of the game explained to them that it was some sort of ancient Sumerian monster called a shedu. Boland recalled that memory years later when he visited Baghdad’s archaeological museum and found a stone carving of a creature there that was described exactly the same way.

“You’re saying that the enemy are a bunch of mythical beasts?” Boland said. “A shedu?”

Gyle covered his face with his left hand and sighed with exhaustion. “We tried to fight them, but we couldn’t. Our weapons were useless. Matt was crushed in the Humvee—they just stomped on it like it was made of cardboard.”

Boland looked away. He wasn’t sure if he could believe it. “What about the unit you were attached to?”

Gyle just stared down at the floor and shook his head. “All dead.”

“How did you get out?” Major Rawls said.

“I just jumped out of the Humvee when it was attacked,” Gyle said. “I played dead until I could see the morning light. Their screams, the screams of those boys, I can still hear them every time I close my eyes. All I had was my compass and I made my way south. Every time I felt they were near, I hid in the sand.”

“These things, these monsters,” Boland said. “Did they come from Mosul? Did it all start from there?”

“I don’t know. They came with the dust storm. Everything that has dust is death,” Gyle said softly.

“Who’s controlling these creatures?” Major Rawls said. “Is it Daesh?”

Gyle looked at him with pity in his eyes. “Don’t you get it yet? Their god doesn’t exist. The Muslims, the IS- everyone in this entire country paid for that mistake with their lives.”

Major Rawls was getting angry. “I’m your superior officer, son. You don’t talk that way to me.”

Boland turned to Major Rawls. “He’s not yours to order around, Major. He’s CIA and unattached to the military.”

Major Rawls stood up. “I’ve had enough of this bullshit.” With that, he got to the door, opened it and left.

Boland crouched down, closer to Gyle. “What can we do? How can we defeat them?”

Gyle just shrugged. “You can’t fight gods. And you can’t fight their angels.”

The commotion in the other room got louder. People were shouting and Boland could hear the howling wind outside of the bunker picking up. He quickly got to the door and opened it just as an Army medic was about to knock on it. Boland let her through while observing the communications room. The medic instantly began to look at Gyle’s injuries as she placed her medical bag on the table. Boland just stood in the doorway and listened to the comms chatter.

“We’ve lost contact with Alpha Company at the southern perimeter of the Green Zone, sir,” a radio operator who was manning one of the radios said to General Sunderland.

General Sunderland frowned. “What was their last transmission?”

“All their CO said was that the dust storm was picking up all around them with possible enemy contact in the heart of the storm, sir.”

General Sunderland pounded his fist on a nearby table. Military internet was down along with GPS and satellite linkups, so all they had left were the FM radios and landlines that were still working. “Goddamn it! Are we in communications with anybody?”

Another radio operator chimed in. “We have riots at the entrance of the embassy compound, sir. People are attempting to rush the barricades. MPs are requesting authorization to use force.”

“Granted,” General Sunderland said grimly. “Order all units to go weapons free. Go to full lockdown. How many Apaches do still we have airborne?”

“At last count six, sir,” a third communications staffer said. “But that was just before the storm hit the Green Zone. Now I can’t raise any of them with our commos.”

General Sunderland kept looking at the charts. “Do we still have the underground lines to the main embassy building?”

The first radio operator started flipping the switches on his radio. “We still do, sir, though we’re getting a lot of static now.”

Major Rawls said nothing but looked at his commanding officer and nodded.

General Sunderland sighed. That was it then. “Signal general evacuation. Code grey alpha one.”

There was furious activity as all the radio operators began to transmit the evacuation order. This meant that all remaining embassy personnel were to try and make it across the Tigris using the Two Stories Bridge that was located south of the compound. From there, a transport unit was supposed to be waiting for them at the Doha Refinery, allowing them to either bring the convoy south, or head to the Al-Rasheed Airport to the east, right beside Camp Rustamiyah, which was supposedly under Iraqi Army control.

Within minutes of the order, General Sunderland strapped on a holstered pistol to his belt and started for the outer door along with Major Rawls as the C2 staff members began to get up while deactivating their communications systems. As Boland turned around, he could see that the medic had replaced the bandage on Gyle’s forearm with a fresh one as she too was packing up.

“You coming with us?” Boland said.

“Do I have a choice?” Gyle said as he got up.
Looks like there wasn’t even time for a shower and a change of clothes,
he thought.

Both men got to the outer door of the bunker and briskly walked out. They were both instantly hit with high winds as the dust storm swirling around them picked up in intensity. Gyle’s goggles and bandanna were tied to his throat and he quickly put them on. Boland just took out a pair of sunglasses and placed them over his eyes. Both men started running towards the vehicle compound where the transportation was waiting. Boland had to squint as small particles of sand were seeping in between the sunglasses and his eyes. They both could see armed military personnel running all over the place.

A sergeant started waving at them across the street in order to guide them towards the garages. Boland could see a Humvee drive up near the main embassy building just as the ambassador and two aides came out of the building’s front doors and started making their way to the vehicle.

Gyle couldn’t believe it. “He’s still here? I thought he was supposed to have gone already!”

Boland too had to shout because of the howling winds as they kept going while looking at them. “He said he would be part of the last group to evacuate. I guess he thinks he can be a hero.”

At that moment, something huge fell out of the sky, and landed right on top of the Humvee just as the ambassador got inside of it. It looked like a giant brown-furred lion and it had bird like wings on its back. Its head resembled that of a horrid looking man with a wild mane of hair and thick beard. The creature’s weight and momentum crushed the vehicle as its wheels gave out, its body smashed in like it went through a junkyard car crusher. Both men instinctively crouched down as the sergeant on the other side of the street leveled his M16 and began firing at the creature.

“We gotta move!” Gyle shouted as he started running towards the vehicle compound.

People on the outside were screaming and running in all directions as Boland began to sprint after Gyle. Despite the blowing wind and dust, they could hear gunfire and explosions all around. As the two men were less than forty yards away, they both quickly drew back in surprise as a huge, building sized creature landed on top of the garages and started to singlehandedly crush and kick the vehicles within. The huge M35 two and a half ton trucks were being trampled and tossed aside like toys; the destruction was so unearthly that every time the creature stomped its bird-like foot down, it created a small earthquake that sent both men sprawling onto the dusty concrete. As Boland looked up, he just couldn’t believe what he was seeing.

The gigantic creature had avian like legs that ended in talons, while its chest and torso were vaguely humanlike, with a skin color of black obsidian. On its back sprouted four feathered wings in a dragonfly-like fashion, with a pair of forward wings turned upwards and two hind wings that were facing down. But its massive face was that of a hideous demon: rounded, bloodshot eyes the size of satellite dishes; its small, stubby nose formed part of a flat snout and beneath them snarled a car-sized maw with numerous fanged teeth that could chew and swallow men whole by the handful. Its massive arms ended in broad claws that started to smash down at the surrounding blast walls as if they were made of paper.

Boland screamed in stark realization of the truth as he remembered the trip to the archaeological museum. In one alcove stood an idol of a dreaded demigod that the ancient Assyrians and Babylonians both worshipped and feared. As he remembered looking at the idol and at the unearthly monster facing them now, he realized that its features were exactly the same. It represented the unceasing wind of desolation, of endless plagues and death. And here it was, in all its destructive glory. He had thought it was but a myth of an old and largely forgotten peoples; a tall tale to keep the young children in check. But in the end, it was real after all.

It was Pazuzu, the god of demons and the wind.

New Mexico

Tara Weiss smiled to her herself as she drove the van down along a stretch of the deserted highway. For the first time in days she had felt good. Larry had finally given her permission to drive the car while he lay asleep, stretched out in the back of the van. She did take a driving class when she was still in high school a few months before, but she never took the test to get the license at the local Department of Motor Vehicles office because her dad didn’t care and she didn’t have a car anyway. They had been on the road for three days now. The van had just passed into the New Mexico state border less than a few hours ago. They probably would have been able to travel faster if they just made a beeline to the Kansas state border, but Larry wanted to specifically avoid the built-up areas and stick to the open road. Since the day began there had been considerably less cars on the back roads that they were taking, but Tara couldn’t tell if that was a good sign or a bad one since they haven’t been able to talk to anybody else. The radio was turned off since Larry was napping away; Tara was sick and tired of hearing Pastor Burnley’s constant sermons about how the world was ending and that the only way to get to salvation was to join his flock in Kansas. That’s where they were heading for anyway so she got it already, no need to keep hearing about it over and over again.