Damien rose from the ground, apparently unhurt by Wormwood steamrolling him. One of his ribs was sticking out, but he shoved it back into place with his palm. Then he went and stood at Lucas’s side.
“The throne is empty,” said Daniel. “Can you just take it back, Lucas?”
Lucas shook his head. “It’s not empty.”
As if proving the jig was up, the flames of the Infernal Throne began to rage, leaping higher and higher. Flesh and bone began to materialise in the fire—a figure taking shape. Lucas breathed heavy. He feared he would not be strong enough for the battle ahead. His brothers were with him, but their foe was almost as strong as God himself.
A being even more ancient.
“Get ready,” said Lucas. “The Red Lord is about to grace us with his presence.”
The Infernal Throne hissed and spat. Heat filled the chamber, and a million screams erupted from the flames. Something massive emerged and started down the steps towards them.
Something wicked.
“Holy shit!” said Vamps. “I’m gunna need a bigger sword.”
Tony Cross
Tony Cross was now a captain, which wasn't bad going for a former Staff Sergeant. Being an officer wasn't like the old days though. All the plummy, silver-spoon idiots were dead, and the only Sandhurst-trained officers alive were the ones with half a brain. Most officers today had been promoted in the field, and seven out of ten had been NCOs in an earlier life.
After the war in Turkey—won when a cancerous old Sergeant-Major jumped through the gate in Istanbul, allowing humanity's forces to take down two angels with bunker busters launched from the back of a lorry—forces in the area refocused on liberating the Middle-East. Tony had re-joined British Forces in Iraq, and he once again served side by side with his countrymen. Not that they worked in isolation though. Men and women from every nation fought together now, and for the first time in history, the Persian Gulf was unified. Arguments of religion and sovereignty had all been forgotten. All that mattered now was sending the demons back to Hell.
And they had been doing just that. The German Federation held Europe’s centre with a vast Army made up of many nations. Britain had been liberated by a brave general with limited resources, and the United States seemed to be rallying slowly. The battle had turned. Tony witnessed it for himself—right here. The Middle East was fighting for peace—and winning.
But at what cost? Here in Iraq, the signs of war predated the demon’s arrival, and there was now barely anything left. People lived in tents and caves because no buildings remained. The population was skinny and starving, unable to get supplies from either trade or carriage. The desert did not nurture.
The painful lack of children was the worst. It had been days since Tony heard their laughter. Were any children left? What of tomorrow? Who could continue mankind's future? Would people breed again? Or were the survivors of this devastating war too damaged to contemplate such a joyful act?
The last thing on Tony's mind was sex. For months, he’d done nothing but kill, so to enjoy a moment of tenderness… It sounded impossible.
Even now, blood stained his hands, and he had no idea if it was even his. He had lived so long in this dirt that his hands and feet calloused. He bled from them often. His feet were totally numb as he walked amongst the debris of some town whose name was probably lost forever. He did, however, feel it when his boot struck something in the dirt.
He reached down and found a Quran, its pages ripped and dirty. Delicately, he wiped the book, but could see nowhere suitable to place the Holy Scripture. He couldn’t bring himself to toss it back in the dirt, so he wandered through the ruins until he found something that wasn’t rubble.
It turned out to be something most unexpected.
The child’s bicycle sat propped against the remnants of a wall. The building had disappeared, yet the bicycle had survived. Its pink basket was decorated with ribbons. What had become of the child it belonged to?
A question he didn't want answered.
Tony moved beside the bicycle and rang its little bell, smiling at the joyful sound it made. He gave the Quran another wipe and then placed it carefully inside the pink basket. The time for religion had ended, perhaps, but respect for the past was still important. If they had any chance of making it, they needed to do things differently. They had to do it together.
No nations, no religion. No more war.
No hate.
It was several days before he found what he was looking for. In the next village, his squad came upon a small community that had miraculously remained untouched by fighting. Only a few-hundred people occupied the village, but Tony found them all gathered together in a green garden outside the schoolhouse. There, an Imam gave lessons to a group of children—maybe a dozen in total. The adults listened too.
When he had one of his men translate what the Imam was teaching the enraptured children, he smiled.
Maybe this time would be different after all.
<<<<>>>>
Damien Banks 2
So apparently he was some sort of Totem. That was what the Irishman had told him several days ago, appearing from nowhere and disappearing just as fast. But the message he gave Damien had stuck in his mind.
You’re a Totem, lad.
Demons walked the earth now, so tall-tales were suddenly far more believable. Damien was a totem, which made him special. His soul was a tether, split throughout a thousand worlds. Harry and Steph too, apparently, although Lucas had only shared the information with him. Obviously, at first, Damien had scoffed at the silly story. He was a mid-level bank employee, not a supernatural being.
But then Lucas had pressed his thumbs against Damien’s eyes and made him see the truth. Made him see the countless versions of himself. All of him warriors in their own way. Many of him dead. What few of him knew, though, was that he had the power to travel between the many worlds of existence.
Damien Banks was not bound by the rules of space and time.
And he needed to believe that now more than ever.
Only he, Harry, and Steph were left alive.
They were surrounded.
The enemy had torn through a hundred soldiers like canines piercing soft flesh. Now they beat at the doors of the abandoned fire station they three of them had holed up in after fleeing the centre of Birmingham. England’s second city was in ruins.
The demons were about to get in.
Harry threw Damien a half empty magazine. He caught it and slammed it into the SA80 he had become disturbingly familiar with. “Make it last, lad.”
Damien nodded. If what Lucas showed him worked, he wouldn’t need to make the ammunition last. If what Lucas had said was true, he could save all three of them.
“We can’t hold out much longer,” said Steph, popping shots from her own combat rifle. The big weapon shook her entire body with its recoil, but she held on tightly. “It was nice meeting you both.”
“We’ve met before,” said Damien, remembering memories not his own. Memories belonging to the other Damiens. The three of them were connected, the three points of a node. When they were together, they could open up a gate. Harry and Steph had no idea.
But Damien knew how. Lucas had put the knowledge in his head.
“Wanna get out of here?” he asked.
Harry looked at him sideways and chuckled. “God, if that were an option.”
“Let’s make it one.” Before the other two could question him as to what he was doing, Damien dropped his weapon and grabbed both Steph and Harry by the back of their necks. He closed his eyes, grit his teeth. Concentrated.
“The fuck are you doing?” asked Harry.
Damien opened his eyes and saw his companions staring at him in confusion. They both shrugged out of his grasp and rubbed their necks.
“Are you okay?” Steph asked, she looked out the window at the demon horde about to break in. “Stupid question, huh?”
Damien shook his head. “No, no, this is wrong. He showe
d me!”
Harry frowned. “Who showed you what?”
“The Irishman.”
Steph shook her head. “Who?”
Damien sighed. After Lucas had left, Harry and Steph lost all memory of the strange man. Only Damien remembered him. Maybe he had imagined the whole meeting. Perhaps he was crazy. Who could blame him? He counted money for a living, not bullets.
“I just… I thought… It should have worked.”
Steph’s eyes had gone wide. She must think him mad.
But then he realised she was staring past him at something behind. He spun around, expecting the enemy to pour in and devour them. Instead he saw something amazing. And terrifying.
“It’s one of those gates,” said Harry, fear and awe spiking his voice in equal measure. “We’re fucked.”
The glass windows of the fire station cracked and shattered. The demons begun to climb inside. “We were fucked anyway,” said Steph. She shoved the last magazine into her magazine.
Damien reached out and pushed her rifle downwards. “You can’t take it where we’re going.”
She huffed. “I suppose you’re right.”
“No, I mean, we’re heading inside there.”
Harry swore. “You must be mad, lad. Those gates lead right to Hell, I can promise you.”
“They lead everywhere. Hell included.”
The demons screeched at their backs, tearing across the large, concrete parking bay. The fire trucks had all gone out on calls, never to return.
Steph swallowed. “I don’t see we have any option that doesn’t suck.”
“Exactly!” Damien grabbed both of their arms and yanked them towards the gate. The fact that they were so obviously in shock helped him. They didn’t resist.
“I wonder how many other Damiens have done this?”
Steph and Harry both frowned at him, their mouths open as they stood inches from the gate.
Damien grunted. “Nevermind. Let’s hope this leads us back to Kansas.”
He dragged the three of them into the gate just as a surge of demons crashed into their backs. Damien cried out as he felt a talon slice through the tender skin of his lower back.
But then the pain gave way to searing blindness and an emptiness in his chest that threatened to make him implode. He heard nothing. Felt nothing. There was nothing.
For a moment he feared—despaired—that he had been misled, and that he had just thrown himself willingly into Oblivion. But then something struck his face and body and knocked the wind from him. The searing blindness faded away and reality returned. He heard breathing either side of him. and when he reached out he felt warm bodies. Steph and Harry.
Sound returned too, but Damien’s muddled brain could not decipher it. He clawed at the ground beneath him and felt mud. He pulled at clumps of grass and tested the parts of his body he needed. His legs worked, and he put them to use, climbing slowly to his feet.
Harry and Steph stood too, both of them pale and shocked. They could puke at any moment. He had to take responsibility for this. Only he knew what they had just done. They had leapt through existence. Grabbed onto God’s life force itself via the gate and used it to travel across a great tapestry.
To here…
Where was here?
“Where the fuck did you just come from?”
Damien and his friends spun around in fright. An entire army met them—an equal mix of soldiers and civilians. An aging woman, not without good looks, stood at the front of the pack. Rifles and shotguns pricked up behind her like porcupine quills. She spoke with an American accent.
Damien stammered. “We… I… It would take a long time to explain. Is… is this Kansas?”
The woman frowned. “No, this is Indiana. We are the Hoosier Resistance.”
Damien rubbed at his aching jaw and wiped away mud. “Indiana, huh? Close enough, I suppose.”
“You came out of a gate,” said the woman, looking at all three of them. “Are you…”
“We’re not demons,” said Steph. “A gate appeared when we were about to be overwhelmed by the enemy. Jumping through it seemed like the only chance we had. We just popped out here. I… I actually can’t believe it.” She glanced at Damien, but he looked away.
No reason to explain that it was they who had opened the gate. Harry and Steph could learn that later. “We came from the United Kingdom,” he said. “The gate spat us out here, but we don’t know how it works. We’re good guys, I promise.”
“I’ll be the judge of that.” The woman looked at them a few moments longer, then thrust out a hand. “My name is Nancy Granger. My children are in England. Don’t suppose you saw them, Alice and Kyle?”
Damien shook his head. “I’m sorry. Everything is a mess.”
A lump moved through the woman’s throat, betraying the fragility she was trying so hard to hide. “I know. I keep trying to reach someone in charge in London, but the place is a ruin by what I have pieced together. The demons are trying to exterminate us, but that’s why were are here, together. If you want to join the Hoosiers, there are only two rules.”
“What are those?” Harry asked, slowly gaining a hold of his confusion.
“Rule one is that you kill any demons on sight.”
“Doable. And rule two?”
The woman grinned. “Misbehave and I’ll cut your nutsacks off.” She glanced at Steph. “Or your tits.”
The three of them looked at each other with a chill running down their spines, but they wasted no time in agreeing to the woman’s terms. Harry even saluted her.
“I’m not a soldier, sir, so no need for that. I’m just a woman who decided to stop sitting back and letting idiots make bad decisions. My husband, Clark, and I were being corralled at a school like cattle, until a riot broke out and the soldiers left us to kill one another. Those who stayed to help are among us now. After the fight died down, I managed to talk some sense into people. Didn’t take long for them to realise that there is only one good place to direct their anger.”
Damien nodded. “The demons?”
“Yes. Just wish they could have realised it before my husband was killed in the murderous chaos. God bless his soul. But those days are behind us. We move forward. No one is in charge here. We work together as fellow human beings. We fight for one another against an enemy that wants us all dead. America was built on the defiance of it’s people. We will not be ruled. We will not bend or break. This is the crossroads of America, and what we do here will determine our future. Do you have any idea how important we all are? Every one of us left?”
Damien thought about what Lucas had told him about being a totem. A walker of worlds. “Yes, I agree. We are important. Let’s fight for the future.”
“Can you do that as a Brit? Can your fight for the American flag?”
Harry and Steph nodded, but Damien shook his head. “No.”
The woman bristled.
Damien explained. “But I can fight for humanity’s flag. Will that do?”
Nancy exhaled slowly, her jaws locked together. Eventually she nodded. “I suppose that will do just fine. Welcome to the Resistance, friends.”
“Glad to be here,” said Harry, looking at Damien with a hint of suspicion. It wouldn’t be long before they would all need to sit down and have a big long talk about the nature of the universe. And all the worlds in it.
“Science never solves a problem without creating ten more.”
– George Bernard Shaw
“On wrongs swift vengeance waits.”
– Alexander Pope
Prologue
Bodies packed the observation room of the Oceanic Super Collider. Scientists and engineers squeezed together, shoulder to shoulder, inside the glass bubble overlooking the vast tunnels below—a 24 mile circuit hidden beneath the Australian Outback. The OSC facility was cutting edge. Six square-miles and possessing a High Luminosity Hadron Collider that even CERN lacked. That was the point. Tired of being left behind by European and United States s
cience elite, Australia, New Zealand, Malaysia, Singapore, Japan, and the Philippines banded together to create the OSC—the largest, most expensive science facility in the world. Its creation had near bankrupted many of the countries involved, but the pride and possibilities it presented were worth it. The calibre of international students already flooding to the University of Melbourne immediately boosted the country’s intellectual population, and donations from the private sector increased all the time. Australia had formed its very own burgeoning Silicon Valley, full of tech start-ups and research companies. The future had switched hemispheres.
And today history would be made. The OSC would fire two extremely dense ionic beams at each other and record the resulting collision with eighteen different sensors. Anything could happen. They might create a stable black hole—with all the possibilities that brought—or even discover a new particle to make the Higgs Bosun a forgettable footnote in the history of Physics. Today’s results might be a precursor to quantum power, and give the host countries an invaluable patent that would quadruple their GDP. Australia might not have led any great wars or invented the Internet, but today it would cement itself at the forefront of human discovery. It was going to make itself heard.
Lead Scientist, Chester Shepard, adjusted his spectacles and waved an arm at his chief engineer. “Initiate the run.”
The room grew silent. Four dozen eyes stretched wide. Anxious breaths held. The room a schoolyard of grinning children. Beneath their feet the glass floor shimmered—a delicate tremble at first, but growing to a fierce vibration that threw them off-balance. It was like standing on the skin of a drum. The excited scientists giggled and widened their stances to keep upright.
An almighty whine accompanied the shaking of the room, the sound of a million parts working in unison. A mechanical dragon breathing fire—the fire of scientific discovery.
Hell on Earth Trilogy: The Complete Apocalyptic Saga Page 82
