“What’s that noise?” Jesse asked.
The sound of large trucks coming toward them could be heard in the distance.
~~~
Military trucks began pouring into the clearing on the shore of the lake.
I never expected the military to be here so fast, Jesse thought as she watched army personnel jumping out of the back of the trucks. The trucks turned and sped away. I wonder what they intend to do. I’m sure they have no idea what they’ll be facing. We don’t even know yet what we’ll be facing.
“We have to slow these guys down,” Matt said.
Steve had made his way to one of the soldiers giving orders. “Are you in charge here?” he asked.
“Kid, stand back,” the soldier said. “Stay out of the way.”
A pilot in full flight uniform from one of the downed F-18s limped out of the woods and walked past Jeremy.
Jeremy caught the pilot by the arm and turned him around. “Were you just shot down?”
“Yes, I have to report in.” The pilot, identified as Captain Strong by her nametag, removed her helmet.
“Wow, a female pilot,” Steve said.
“You’re hurt,” Jesse said.
“It’s nothing,” Strong said. “Only a sprained ankle and a few scratches. I need to report in.”
“You’re also bleeding from your head and shoulder,” Jesse observed.
“I’m okay,” Strong replied.
“Let me take a look,” Jesse insisted.
Reluctantly, the captain stood still as Jesse checked her out.
“Would it be okay with you if I gave you a big hug?” Jesse asked. “You’re a hero, you know.” Before she could say no, Jesse grabbed her around the shoulders and gave her an uncomfortably long hug. “There you go. You’ll be just fine.”
The captain walked away with no limp.
“We need to find the one in charge before these guys do something stupid,” Jeremy said.
“There’s a general coming here as soon as the camp is set up,” Steve said. “We need to wait for him. I suggest we cool our heels until he arrives.”
The Alliance walked into the forest out of sight, but close enough to see what was happening. The soldiers weren’t setting up a camp. Rather, they were organizing weapons and ammunition. Heavy armored cars and several M1A2 Abrams tanks rolled into the area. A jeep with a general’s flags on the front fenders rolled in, and everyone in the area stopped their activities and saluted.
“There’s our man,” Matt said as he led the Alliance in that direction.
They were stopped by two armed soldiers. “You can’t go any farther. This is a military operation. You have to leave.”
“We’re not leaving,” Steve insisted. “We have to talk to the general.”
“He’s busy,” the soldier said. “You can’t talk to him.” He stepped closer and put his rifle across Steve’s chest.
Oh no, Jesse thought. Steve isn’t going to like that.
Before she could react, Steve grabbed the rifle from the soldier and knocked him to the ground.
Six soldiers surrounded the Alliance, their weapons pointed at the four.
Jesse put out her hands to hold them back. “Whoa, whoa, whoa . . .” She stood her ground. Matt was at her right, Steve was at her left, and Jeremy was right behind her left shoulder.
“Ask to speak to the general again,” Jeremy whispered.
Matt looked at the others. “Don’t let them know the secret about the invaders,” he said out loud. “Only the general can be told.” He turned back to the soldiers. “Do you want to be the ones who kept the general in the dark? If you do, you’ll regret that decision.”
The soldier got up off the ground. “Drop the weapon,” he said. He stared directly at Steve. “Drop the weapon!”
Steve gently laid the rifle on the ground.
The soldier turned to another soldier. “Go get Sergeant O’Rinski.”
It was only a minute or so later that Sergeant O’Rinski came into view. Of medium height, he was built like a fireplug, with every ounce, muscle. The authority in his stride, together with his short-cropped hair, made an unmistakable statement of a dedicated soldier.
“What is it, Shorty?” the sergeant asked.
“These kids say they want to talk to Small,” Shorty said as he pointed his rifle at the four. “They say they know something about the invaders.”
“I’ve told you before,” O’Rinski said as he glanced at the soldier out of the corner of his eye. “It’s not Small. It’s General Small.” He turned back to the Alliance. “What do you know about the invaders?”
“We know a lot, but we’ll only talk to General Small,” Jeremy said as he stepped in front of Jesse. “You’ll fail if you try to attack without knowing what we know.”
One of the soldiers began to chuckle. The sergeant glanced in his direction, and he immediately stopped.
“Follow me,” the sergeant said. He turned and walked into the bustling camp, then led them to a newly set-up tent and escorted them inside. “Wait here.”
“We don’t have much time,” Jesse said, urgency in her voice. “Please hurry.”
It was an agonizing fifteen minutes before the sergeant returned with a man who identified himself as Colonel Gavin.
“My sergeant tells me you have information about the invaders. What kind of information?”
Steve jumped in. “She’s an evil queen from Gandoral, another world.”
“Okay, we’re done here.” The colonel looked disapproving at the sergeant as he left the tent.
“Really? An evil queen? Stay here!” The sergeant was clearly upset.
“You’re an idiot, Steve,” Jeremy said. “We’ll never get to the general that way.”
“We should walk over there and talk to him,” Steve said. “I’m not sure why we’re sitting around.”
“Well, they have guns for one thing,” Matt said, “and we don’t want anyone getting hurt.”
As Steve headed out of the tent, Jesse and Jeremy tried to grab his arms, but he shook them both loose. The three followed him out, taking the two guards standing outside by surprise. The Alliance, led by Steve, walked unhindered toward the general’s command tent, but by the time they got to the door, ten soldiers had surrounded them with weapons ready.
Colonel Gavin came out of the tent. “I thought I told you to wait,” he said, obviously perturbed.
“First, we aren’t in the army, so we don’t take orders from you,” Steve said, showing his belligerent attitude. “Second, we don’t have any time for waiting. The sooner we have a chance to talk to your general, the sooner we can save lives.”
Jesse stepped forward. “We have urgent information your general needs in order to properly deal with the invaders.”
“We want in now!” Jeremy demanded.
Just then General Small came through the door.
Jesse stepped back in surprise. His name certainly doesn’t match his stature, she thought as she watched the giant of a man exit the tent. He’s at least six foot, six inches tall and over two hundred fifty pounds. All muscle.
“Your timing is pretty bad,” the general said. “I only have a minute. Come inside and make it quick.”
Chapter 7
How Did You Do That?
Torron smiled widely, seeing everything was in place. Cradled in the middle of the large, round black granite table, the huge crystal ball was mounted in its place, with two-thirds of it showing above the table. The ball was five feet in diameter, and the table was ten feet in diameter.
“Is the Mega-Crystal working?” Torron asked General Hasmin.
“Yes, Your Majesty,” the general responded with a grim look on his face. “All of the plans are going well except at Miramar. We’re getting a great deal of resistance there.”
“Where is Jensen?” Torron asked.
“He’s checking on the communications group, Your Highness,” the general assured the queen. “He should be back in a minute. Drake did
well when he recruited him from MIT twenty-two years ago.”
“Yes, my son pulled together the best technology team ever assembled,” the queen said as she stepped up to her throne, which was raised off the floor four feet so she would have a better view of what was happening in the Mega-Crystal. “Over the past hundred years, he took engineers and scientists from Earth. I’ve been surprised by how easy it has been to mold them into willing participants.”
Thomas Jensen, a short little man, entered the room.
“Jensen, give me a summary of our progress in all the locations,” the queen commanded.
The small man stepped to the granite table and began typing on a keyboard. He spoke as the scenes in the large crystal ball began to change. “When we started landing at the airfield at Miramar, the marines on the base immediately responded with deadly force.”
The crystal ball came alive with a playback of the encounter.
“As you can see, both sides saw heavy losses. However, we were able to get the shield in place.”
A light blue dome appeared over the air base. The rifle, mortar, and tank fire bounced off or exploded on the surface of the shield. As Jensen spoke, images of the cities from a high altitude could be seen in the crystal ball.
“Vancouver, Seattle, Portland, San Francisco, Los Angeles, and San Diego have all been secured with little or no initial fighting. As you can see, the shields are in place, and the portals are all operational. Our armies will be in place on schedule. In the meantime, they’ll be protected by the shields.”
“Here is the dome in Oakland,” Jensen continued. “You can see the enemy is trying to destroy the dome. Their missiles simply explode on its surface.”
“How are the portals holding up against the enemy?”
“There are no issues with the portals,” Jensen said. “The enemy aircraft can’t fly through the black cloud.”
The crystal ball displayed an F-18 shooting at the cloud with missiles exploding on the surface. Another plane attempted to fly through the cloud and exploded on the surface.
“From the Gandoral side of the portal, it looks and operates like it always has, a black cloud. However, when it comes close to Earth, my new transport technology shield creates a solid tube. It looks like a cloud, but it’s solid. Once all the troops are here, it will withdraw.”
~~~
The tent was filled with soldiers of all ranks.
A sergeant rushed in right behind the Alliance. He stood at attention and saluted the general. “Sir, I have a report,” the sergeant said.
The general pointed to a row of chairs against the wall of the tent and motioned for the Alliance to be seated. “I’ll be with you in a minute.”
Steve shook his head as he sat down. “Okay, here we are again, waiting.”
The tent became quiet as the sergeant gave his report.
“The invaders’ initial landing site is about five miles up the shoreline. They’re moving into the woods in all directions. They’re not attacking. They’re clearing a huge area and setting up a large encampment. They have a perimeter set up and act swiftly if anyone approaches. They’re not aggressive. They seem to be on defense only.”
“How many?” Small asked.
“I would estimate several thousand, this only the second day.” The sergeant hesitated before speaking again. “They keep pouring out of the black cloud. In a week, they could have tens of thousands more, plus more supplies. Also . . . the troops aren’t all men. Most are monsters of various kinds. I don’t know exactly how to describe them. I do know this: one of them looks like a dragon.”
“There’s no such thing as dragons,” one of the soldiers said quietly, but loud enough to be heard.
The other doubting soldiers murmured and chuckled.
“I have pictures,” the sergeant said and handed his cell phone to the general.
Small flipped through the photos. “Did you engage them?”
“Yes, at one point we had gotten too close,” the sergeant said. “They charged us with rifles, swords, and arrows. At first, we thought they would be easy prey, but they were protected by an invisible shield of some kind. Their arrows and bullets came through, but nothing we sent their way made it through. Our bullets and mortars bounced off or exploded on the surface of the shield. They had no interest in coming after us, so I left a dozen men to watch them from a distance and report back to me if they see any changes.”
“Hey, you’re the kids I saw when I came into camp,” Captain Strong said quietly as she pulled a chair over and sat down in front of the Alliance. The discussion between the general and the sergeant continued as Strong leaned forward to talk to the Alliance. “How did you do that?” she asked Jesse.
“Do what?” Jesse asked.
“I had a sprained ankle, a cut on my head, and a cut on my shoulder. You can see the blood on my uniform.” She pointed to the bloodstains. “I got to the infirmary, and they found no cuts, and my ankle is one hundred percent. How did you do that?”
The captain got nothing but blank stares from the Alliance.
“Seriously, I’m not stupid,” she insisted. “You did something when we hugged. What did you do?”
Before Jesse could answer, the general approached. “Come with me,” he said and ushered the Alliance into a room at the far end of the command tent.
Captain Strong followed.
General Small sat behind a desk, and another soldier got ready to take notes. “Okay, you have five minutes,” Small said. “Go.”
Before the Alliance had a chance to say anything, another soldier burst into the room. “General Small, you have to see this video right away.”
The general excused himself and went back into the command center, followed by the notetaker.
The Alliance and Strong had sat down on folding chairs positioned against the walls of the room. Strong moved her chair so that she was facing the Alliance.
Matt looked at the others and then turned to Strong. “The invasion is coming from a distant planet called Gandoral. The intent of the invasion is to take over the world. The leader of the invaders is a queen named Torron. She’s evil and will stop at nothing to succeed.”
“An evil queen?” Strong sat back in her chair and shook her head. “That story will go nowhere with the general. You’ll have to do better than that.”
“Look, we don’t have time to give you the big picture,” Matt said. “The short version is, we’re wizards and we’re tasked with the responsibility to push the queen and her evil army of monster soldiers back to Gandoral where they came from.”
“Well, you’re going to have a hard time,” Strong said. “Yesterday morning, thirteen of these funnel clouds entered Earth’s atmosphere. They’re landing armies at airports in Vancouver, Seattle, Portland, San Francisco, Los Angeles, and San Diego. We’re currently estimating three to four thousand soldiers coming out of those clouds per day at each location. There could be upward of a half million enemy soldiers here within a week.”
The Alliance was stunned.
Jesse pulled out the map. “We knew they were coming into the West Coast in thirteen places,” she said as she unfolded it. “We didn’t know how many of her soldiers she was bringing. The last time we faced her, she brought about a hundred fifty thousand.”
Strong sat back again with a doubtful look on her face. “What do you mean, the last time you faced her?”
Steve laughed. “If you think our story about the evil queen is a little outrageous, wait until you hear the next part.” He grinned as he motioned for Jeremy to speak.
Jeremy raised his eyebrows and scratched his head. “Well . . . we . . .”
The general reentered the room and sat down. “Okay, you have five minutes.”
Chapter 8
Zolog
Torron had returned to her private residence, an exact copy of her residence on Gandoral. As she descended the steps into the large pool of her steaming bubble bath, her clothing melted away at the water level. She rela
xed as the bubbles surrounded her. I wonder how Zolog feels about my plan now, she thought. I have everything in place. The plan that Drake and I have put together is solid. He was doubtful back in 1955, but today he can see the wisdom of the plan. She chuckled to herself and then thought back to that dreadful meeting with Zolog . . .
~~~
I don’t know why I’m being summoned, Torron thought as she rode Firestar, her dragon, across the short distance from her castle into Zolog’s realm. I haven’t been here in almost two hundred twenty years. The last time had been right after the fifty-year war was over. He was happy that I was able to defeat Mezmorel. He gave me even more power after the war ended. Maybe he’s concerned about my loss in Africa.
The pale-yellow barrier extended from the top of the large stone wall surrounding all of Horgon. From a vantage point high above the walls, it was clear, the only thing behind the wall was Zolog’s castle. There was no large kingdom beyond the Gates of Horgon that led into Zolog’s realm. The castle was dark and evil-looking, its seven towers topped by seven large black flags. Each flag had a bright yellow snake head in the center. The snake head was a cross between a rattlesnake and Zolog himself.
The queen and dragon both winced as they passed through the yellow barrier and the orange sky of Gandoral was replaced by the bloodred sky of Zolog’s realm. The two moons were replaced by one large moon hanging low in the east, and the sun was replaced by two suns high in the sky, a large one with a smaller one in front and a little to the left.
Okay, we passed through, Torron thought as she stroked the dragon’s neck. I never know if we will or not. She had seen others vanish to Skornes-Tarude as they went through the barrier, never to be seen or heard from again.
Firestar landed at the foot of the stairs leading into Zolog’s castle, and Torron dismounted. She always used her most attractive persona when going to see Zolog. Beautiful, with piercing deep blue eyes, clear white skin, and shiny black hair that hung in waves down her back, she was clothed in a ruby-red formal dress fit for a queen. She held a scepter in her right hand and wore a gold, diamond-studded tiara for a crown. She walked with authority up the stairs and through the large double doors leading into the castle.
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