When the Gods Aren't Gods: Book Two of The Theogony (23 page)

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Under the Great Pyramid of Cholula, Keppler-22 ‘b’, August 12, 2020

“
Salope
,” swore Remy Martin as his suit died. Remy was a strong man and was able to carry the extra weight of the hundred-pound suit if he had to, but the additional load was inconvenient. He took off his helmet to find that the other three members of his group were doing the same. “My suit just died,” he said. “Yours, too?”

All three nodded. The underground passageway seemed more narrow and claustrophobic without the extra light of the suits. The torch hanging on the wall did not illuminate much more than the alcove and the entrance to the maze. All four of the suits beeped, nearly simultaneously. “Anyone know what happened?” Remy asked.

Irina stood looking at the back of Wazir’s suit. “I’m guessing we just took some sort of electromagnetic pulse that fried the electronics of our suit.”

“Why do you think that?”
asked Sigvar Borsheim.

“Because Wazir’s emergency backup has been activated,” Irina said. “We have two hours before we blow up.
”

Inside the
Great Pyramid of Cholula, Keppler-22 ‘b’, August 12, 2020

“
Oww,” Calvin moaned. He awoke on his stomach, and it felt like someone was sitting on his back. His head felt woozy, and everything seemed strangely quiet. “What hit me?” he asked. He felt his head, and there was a large lump on the back of it. Wait, he wondered. How could he feel his head? Where was his helmet?

A female voice came from next to him. “
There was a big explosion,” the voice said, “and everyone got knocked out. I just woke up to find the coatl gone, and everyone lying here.”

Ryan pushed himself up
next to Calvin and looked the other way to see Sella’s concerned face looking at him. “Are you all right?” she asked. He saw that she was holding his helmet. There was a dim light from two torches that were burning near the doorway where the coatl had been. Although the priests were lying there, the coatl was gone.

“I think so,” Ryan replied. He pushed himself up. “Crap,” he said, realizing his suit was
turned off. He stood up awkwardly and saw that most of the others were doing the same. His suit beeped at about the same time as everyone else’s suits. “
Fuck,
” he swore, “my suit is fried.” He walked over to Calvin and said, “Sir, we’re in some real shit.”

“What do you mean?” Calvin
asked, still a little stunned.

“Whatever th
at explosion was, it must have set off a
massive
electromagnetic pulse,” Master Chief said. “All of our suits have been fried.”

“
Yeah, mine too,” Calvin agreed, not understanding where he was going.

“What powers the suits?” Master Chief
asked.

“About two and a half kilograms of antimatter,” Calvin answered
automatically. “Why?”

“Because the containment system is fried on all of our suits,” Master Chief replied. “They are all operating on their backup
systems, which are providing emergency stabilization to the antimatter containment vessels. In a little less than two hours, the emergency systems are going to fail, and each suit is going to detonate in a 107 megaton explosion. It will be less than that since the batteries aren’t at full power, but I doubt that it will really matter much to us. If we don’t get these suits repaired, we’re going to wipe out this island at a minimum, and maybe even the whole planet. I don’t know; I’m no scientist. What I do know is that we won’t care. No matter how fast you run, you won’t escape the blasts.”

“All right,” Calvin
said. “We need to get somewhere that we can call down support. I can’t reach the
Vella Gulf
on my implant.”

“Sir, you can’t reach
anyone
,” Master Chief replied. “Whatever fried our suits also fried our implants.”

“That’s why it’s so quiet,”
Calvin remarked. “Sorry, I hit my head and am a little out of it,” he confessed. “Well, I expect that they’ll send someone down once they realize that our suits are not responding,” he continued. “We just need to be where they can reach us when they get here. We’ve got to get out of here, and we’ve got to do it now.”

Inside the
Great Pyramid of Cholula, Keppler-22 ‘b’, August 12, 2020

“Damn, that hurts
,” Private First Class John ‘Jet’ Li said. “My suit just died.”

“Yeah, mine too,” Corporal Jimmy ‘Colonel’ Sanders
replied. He had been in the act of sitting down when the suit suddenly died, causing him to lose his balance. He almost fell into the hole, but was just able to roll out of harm’s way.

Both suits beeped.

“That’s not what I think it is,” Jet asked. “Is it?”

“Ah’m afraid it is,” Colonel
answered in his Southern drawl. “Ah’d call fo help, but mah implants ain’t workin’ either.”

“My implants aren’t working, either,” Jet
replied. “And now that the suit isn’t working, it’s not holding my leg in place, and
that
hurts like shit. If I hadn’t been leaning back against the wall, the suit would have flipped me over.” He paused and looked at the senior man. “What are we going to do?”

“Well,”
Colonel said, “Ah don’ think you’re gonna be able ta outrun the blast. Truth be told, Ah don’ think Ah could, either. Ah think we jus’ sit tight right here and wait for help. If our suits are out, everyone else’s are, too. They’ll come for us.” I hope, he added to himself.

* * * * *

Bridge, TSS
Vella Gulf
, In Orbit Around Keppler-22 ‘b’, August 12, 2020

“We don’t know that they are dead,” Arges
said, “but we do know that neither their implants nor their suits are functioning. It is quite possible that they were destroyed by the EMP; that would be consistent with the data.”

Captain Griffin looked at Bullseye, sitting in the squadron commander’s chair. “So if they are without their suits or implants,” she asked, “how do we contact them?”

“We can’t,” Bullseye answered. “They had a backup radio, but that would be fried as well. The only way we’re going to contact them is to go down there and do it face-to-face.”

“Is there any way to do it without causing the same confrontation with the locals that we were trying to avoid?” Captain Griffin
asked.

“No, ma’am,” Bullseye
replied. “We’ll have to land in front of the temple. Everyone is going to see us.”

“I’m sorry, Captain
Griffin, but I do not think you are seeing the big picture,” Arges said. “You
must
go down there, and you must do it
right now
.”

“And why’s that?” Captain
Griffin asked.

“Because if their suits have shut down,” Arges
replied, “then their antimatter containment systems are operating in backup mode. In a little less than two hours, they are going to detonate with the force of over
two gigatons
. It may very well be an extinction level event for the whole planet.”

“Damn it,”
Captain Griffin said. “We’ve got to get those suits off the planet.” She turned to Bullseye. “Get a shuttle down there with Night and all of his available personnel ASAP. Get them into that pyramid and get those damn suits. No fooling around; kill anyone you need to. I don’t care.
Get those damn suits off the planet!
”

SF-1 Ready Room,
TSS
Vella Gulf
, Orbit Keppler-22 ‘b’, August 12, 2020

“We need both shuttles manned ASAP,” Bullseye
said. “One will carry the second squad to the surface and bring back both of the squads afterwards. The other shuttle will take the suits into space. Once there, they will dump the suits and run.”

The operations officer,
Lieutenant Imagawa ‘Samurai’ Sadayo, looked at his clipboard. “Since you and I know the mission parameters, and time is of the essence, LT Simpson will pilot the first shuttle that takes the platoon to the planet, with you as his WSO,” Samurai replied. “Lieutenant Boudreau and I will fly the other shuttle to take off the suits.”

“Sounds good,” Bullseye
said. “I’ll go talk to Night; you set up the shuttle launches.”

Squad Bay,
TSS
Vella Gulf
, Orbit Keppler-22 ‘b’, August 12, 2020

“OK,” Night
said. “It looks like the CO has gotten his ass into trouble, and it’s up to us to go and save him. Something down there generated an electromagnetic pulse of huge proportions, which fried the other squad’s suits and implants. In about an hour and a half, 18 suits are going to explode with a detonation that is going to end life on this planet.
We have got to get them off
.”

He looked at the squad assembled in front of him. “No delay will be tolerated. Kill anyone that gets in your way. They’re dead anyway if we don’t get those suits off
of the planet. If you see a flying snake, kill it immediately, no questions asked.”

“Anything else
?” Night asked. “All right, let’s go. Grab your weapons and gear; we leave in 10 minutes.”

Inside the
Great Pyramid of Cholula, Keppler-22 ‘b’, August 12, 2020

“Move out
,” Calvin ordered.

“You heard the man,” Master Chief
said. “Let’s get a move on.”

Mr. Jones and
Petty Officer Sherkov went through the door. The strongest men, they were able to carry their suits and still brandish the spears that they had liberated from the Mayan priests. The Terrans had disarmed the men and sent them out the way the Terrans had come in, as the blast had opened the door. Sergeant Tagliabue followed behind Jones and Sherkov, holding one of the torches.

Following the Italian, Father
Zuhlsdorf walked along in a black cassock, with his sword in one hand and his suit thrown over the opposite shoulder.

Looking at the priest’s strange choice of clothing, Calvin asked,
“Is that what you wore under your suit?”

“I do like wearing a black cassock whenever possible,” Father Zuhlsdorf
replied, “but no, that is not what I had on. It clumps up in all of the wrong places inside of a suit and chafes something fierce on a long march. Besides,” he added, “it would ruin the creases on it if I did.”

“So, you put it in your pack and brought it along, just in case
we took off the suits?” asked Calvin.

“Yes,
” Father Zuhlsdorf said. “It’s good to be prepared. To me, it is part of the armor of my faith.” He smiled. “It’s also pretty comfortable to wear in a stuffy pyramid.”

Calvin was left to shake his head as the
line of soldiers continued past him and further into the pyramid. Since everyone now had to carry their hundred pound suits, they had left most of their gear, including their non-functional rifles, in the EMP room. Most of the special forces troopers were able to carry their suits with no problem, but it was all that Bob and Doug could do to wrestle theirs down the corridor. Not only were the suits heavy, the therapods just weren’t built for carrying things. When they started to drag on the floor, the two women went to help them. With one of the women helping each of them, the therapods were able to manage, barely, although it looked like the frail women were carrying more of the load than Bob or Doug.

As he was walking through the door, Calvin had a thought. “Hey, Master Chief,” he said. “If the other squad comes in the front entrance of the pyramid, they’re not going to know how to find us and are going to fall for the traps. We better send someone back to lead them up.”

“You’re right, sir,” Master Chief responded. He turned to the squad. “Petty Officer Levine, go back to where we left Jet and the Colonel. Wait there for the rest of the squad to get here and then lead them up.”

“Why me?”
the Israeli asked. “Because I gave Al-Sabani a hard time earlier?”

“Because I said so
!” Master Chief yelled. “I could give a shit about earlier. You’re the one with the right skill set to operate independently, now go fucking do it. We don’t have time to screw around!”

“Sure thing, Master Chief,” Petty Officer Levine replied
, chastened. He turned and left, and the rest of the squad started forward again.

Under the Great Pyramid of Cholula
, Keppler-22 ‘b’, August 12, 2020

“Grab that torch,” Irina said, “and let’s
find the secret door.”

Remy Martin pulled the torch out of the sconce. As the torch came out in his hand, a sliding, grating sound was heard in the distance, accompanied a roar.

“I do not know what that was,” Sigvar Borsheim commented, “but whatever it was sounded very large and
very
unfriendly. I recommend that we hurry.” He pointed his rifle into the maze while Martin and Rozhkov began searching the cubicle.

Wazir went to stand beside Borsheim. “You know that the rifles do
not work, yes?” he asked.

“I am aware,” Borsheim
replied, looking out into the maze. “I am hoping that whatever is coming doesn’t know that.”

“Good point,” Wazir agreed, leveling his rifle into the maze.

Borsheim heard a scuffling, dragging noise coming from the darkness. It sounded even larger than what he had previously thought. “You need to hurry faster!” he urged.

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