The Never Army

by Hodges, T. Ellery

  Jonathan listened, but his expression looked doubtful. “Even if we somehow showed them the truth behind the Borealis, the equation doesn’t change. They’re still facing extinction.”

  “But they don’t think they can lose,” Hayden said. “They aren’t afraid to sacrifice as many of their lives as it takes because the Promised Land is more than their salvation, it’s their manifest destiny.”

  “But, how do we do that, Hayden?” Paige asked.

  He tossed his hands up. “I told you I didn’t know.”

  Jonathan considered Hayden’s angle again “Can you think of any way you might break Lights the Sun’s belief?”

  Hayden looked more than a little uncomfortable with this question.

  “He’s been kept in a cage, hasn’t he already seen things in this world that give him doubt?” Collin asked.

  “No,” Hayden said. “That’s actually reinforcing his beliefs. He’s been told that we’re godless, and yet have harnessed powers only meant to be wielded by gods. Which is just another reason the prophet wants us destroyed. I don’t think that is an ironic coincidence either, as Malkier wants humanity dead or broken because he fears us ever becoming a technological threat.”

  “Go back a sec, Lights the Sun thinks we’re a godless species?” Collin asked. “You telling me you haven’t tried to convert him?”

  Hayden scowled. “I didn’t try to convert him. But yeah, we discussed the topic. It’s more than a waste of time, nothing in Earthly religions is relevant to him. Think about it, he doesn’t fear death, he only fears his species’ extinction. His idea of life everlasting is being remembered by his people and having as much progeny as possible.

  “I tell him about Jesus performing miracles and he hardly sees the big deal.”

  “What do you mean by that?” Leah asked.

  “The Ferox, they aren’t fragile. They don’t die of sickness and disease, they die of...”

  Hayden paused for a moment to nod toward Jonathan. “Well, if they’re going to die, they really want it to be fighting Mr. Rain Bringer over here, but our soldiers are the next best thing. That said, their Alphas can die of old age. The Reds and Greens, if they aren’t killed in the arena or never reach Alpha, will eventually die from complications around stunted development.”

  “Lights the Sun doesn’t understand why we consider our religious figures as gods at all. It’s not his fault, we’re just that different on a fundamental level. For instance, our religious figures are teachers of a moral code—they tell us how we should treat one another. The Ferox don’t need to be taught this, apart from some early childhood confusion, they already do no harm to members of their own species.”

  “Did you tell him about more than one religion?” Collin asked.

  Hayden groaned. “Yeah, I mean, as best I could. But it really didn’t help matters. He didn’t understand how our tribes could have so many different gods. He thinks that if any of our gods were true they would rid our world of the false gods.

  “Again, the Ferox don’t have this problem. The closest Lights the Sun came to describing different belief systems were minor disagreements that developed between tribes during the period of the Borealis abandonment. Some tribes came to believe different truths about the nature of their gods. But, the prophet was pretty much the second coming for the Ferox. He arrived, unified them, told them what beliefs to hold true to.”

  The table grew quiet for a moment.

  “Lights the Sun has a point,” Heyer said.

  The alien hadn’t spoken since Hayden had started them down this road.

  “Throughout history, mankind has been a species with many fears. So, it has many gods,” Heyer said. “The Ferox have only one true fear, and so, one god.”

  “Yeah,” Collin said. “It’s terrifying. Humanity’s worst nightmare is an enemy easily united.”

  “Perhaps,” Heyer said, then turned to look at Jonathan. “But, in my experience, every strength has its weakness.”

  CHAPTER SIXTY-TWO

  NOV 06, 2005 | 8 PM | HANGMAN’S TREE

  “TURN OFF THE implant,” Jonathan said. “Maybe he’ll pull out of it. Maybe he won’t, but I’m not letting him wake up with that much power.”

  Since the procedure, Grant had laid on the bed of his cell, the Alpha Slayer glowing in his chest. His eyes had opened, but he didn’t seem to be there behind them. He looked straight up into nothing, shivering from time to time, like a confused child surrounded by angry adults.

  Whatever was going on inside of him, he wasn’t responding to any gentle prods or calling out his name.

  Jonathan left shortly after Heyer agreed the implant should be disabled. In his current state, the pained screams of Grant as the implant deactivated may very well have been involuntary. Still, they followed Jonathan out of the cell. Heyer had made no move to keep Jonathan in the room. He stayed at Grant’s side and waited. Heyer got the impression that Jonathan’s leaving could only help Grant, though how much he had no way of knowing.

  It was hours later before Grant suddenly blinked and became lucid enough to speak.

  “What did I do, what did he do? My shadow . . . me . . .”

  Heyer looked at him sympathetically. He couldn’t tell if Grant even knew he was there, if the man was even aware he was speaking. He murmured to himself like that for a while, but eventually he looked Heyer in the eye and he seemed to be in there.

  “Who else knows?” Grant asked. “What he did?”

  Heyer sighed, but he understood. His own shadow had made decisions he didn’t want anyone to ever know. Only Jonathan carried his secret. He didn’t lose sleep over that, what kept him awake was knowing what some part of him was capable of under the right circumstances.

  “Only those who need to,” Heyer said. “No one wants your secret known, it would be counterproductive.”

  “But you know. That means . . .”

  Grant couldn’t finish the words. He choked on them like a child who had only just understood how badly they had disappointed their parents. Grant nodded, looking up to meet the alien’s eyes. “I see why he did what he did. I hate that I can see it.”

  Grant clearly had acquired the shadow’s memories. What remained unclear to Heyer was if he had also acquired any of the mental deterioration that caused the memories to be made. From what he was seeing he didn’t think that was the case. Heyer had never seen the man be capable of showing so much . . . shame.

  “Are you able to differentiate,” Heyer asked. “Can you tell which life you lead and which you inherited?”

  “It’s . . . confusing,” Grant said. “Like having two different stories and feeling as though I lived through both. One is no less real than the other. I don’t like it.”

  “I’ll stay with you,” Heyer said. “Help you figure it out.”

  Grant nodded and let his head rest back on the pillow.

  “You don’t have to rush getting your head wrapped around it all. Do you—did he—remember anything that might help us?”

  “I . . . he . . . didn’t understand most of what Malkier was doing. It wasn’t like he bothered explaining. But I can describe some of what he saw. Tell you what he heard.”

  Whether or not Grant would resurface had been unclear when Jonathan left him to Heyer. The strategic side knew it would be for the best if he could be useful. A less evolved part of him didn’t want the man to come out of it. His feelings toward Grant were simple hatred.

  He didn’t want them to become complicated, just hatred.

  When Heyer let him know that the man was awake, he had called for the war council. Jonathan was late but found himself in the company of folks who didn’t feel drastically different about Grant. Though, while his roommates never particularly liked the man, they weren’t quite on the same level as being of indifference if he had been rendered brain dead.

  Leah was in the middle of an explanation when he arrived in the donut room. Apparently, she’d known far less about Grant than they had all assumed.
Grant’s involvement in The Cell’s investigation had been a leg of Olivia’s operation. Leah’s knowledge of him was that he was a temporary set of ears inside the house, chosen because he was already in place when the investigation began.

  Jonathan had noticed a shift in the atmosphere with her and the others. Where previously they tolerated her with a poorly hidden malice, the bitterness was less than before. Leah’s openness about The Cell’s operation was being met more with interest than judgment.

  When he walked in, his roommates were in the middle of absorbing how freely Jonathan and the rest had often spoken in the presence of Jack—Leah’s younger brother. Collin in particular had taken a liking to the kid. He had been welcomed into the garage almost the first week Leah moved in next door.

  “Wait, so did he actually like motorcycles?” Collin asked.

  Paige frowned. “Really, that’s what you want to know?”

  Leah smiled at them. “Of course, he actually liked going over for play dates with you three. The Cell didn’t have to pay him or anything.”

  “Outsmarted by a six-year-old,” Collin said. “I feel betrayed . . . and a little hurt. I feel hurt and betrayed.”

  Collin’s self-mockery was more humor than honest, but Leah played along, giving him a sympathetic look. “He isn’t an evil mastermind. The whole point was that no one suspects a kid. Jack didn’t even know he was spying. When he gave accounts of your interactions, he thought he was seeing a grief counselor . . .”

  She’d trailed off, looking over their shoulders to where Heyer had just appeared. He quickly moved to join them at the table.

  Collin glanced at Leah and whispered, “There will be follow-up questions on this.”

  “Grant came out of his stupor?” Jonathan asked. “He give you something?”

  Heyer nodded, then requested Mr. Clean bring up a projection at the center of the table. A large holographic image of a red and black planet—The Feroxian Plane—began to circulate at the center.

  “Anyone else suddenly feel like we’re about to see plans for the Deathstar?” Hayden asked.

  Heyer gave him a sobering glance, and Hayden smiled awkwardly before shrinking back into his chair.

  “Mr. Clean, zoom in on the coordinates.”

  A square highlighted on a portion of the planet’s surface, and seemed to zoom down until they were looking at a scaled elevation map of the terrain. What they were looking at would best be called a pit, but not one made by any natural forces. Rather, a perfectly cylindric depression in the surface. The clean sculpted lines were a stark contrast to the surrounding landscape, which had the contours of a planet shaped by normal geological evolution.

  This pit was clearly built with great care. Which meant it had purpose.

  Inside, in a ring near the pit’s walls, were hundreds of small shapes surrounding one large platform at the center. Heyer was quick to draw their attention to the smaller shapes, and Mr. Clean brought one into a close-up view for them to see.

  A familiar holographic sundial rotated between them.

  “They will be moving the gateways,” Heyer said. “All of them.

  “The pit was like a model battlefield. Each gateway, a single troop. Each troop placed with precision inside a squadron. There were seven squadrons, and each was shaped in an arc. The seven arcs together formed a complete ring around one large central platform.”

  “Grant gave you all of this?” Paige asked, not hiding her skepticism.

  “Once my brother knew I would not support his plans to take Earth, Malkier and Cede began studying a schematic of this design. Grant’s shadow had no idea what he was looking at, but once he began describing what he’d seen, it did not take long for Mr. Clean and I to recognize what he had witnessed,” Heyer said.

  “Once we knew what it was, we also knew there was only one place for Malkier to build it,” Heyer said. “The central platform is positioned directly over Cede.”

  “What exactly are we looking at?” Anthony asked.

  “A conduit,” Heyer said. “A means to bring an invading force into The Never without breaking the fabric of existence.”

  Apart from Jonathan, whose eyes remained on the circling model, the rest of the council looked at one another to see if anyone else was following better than they were. Seeing as that wasn’t the case, Paige spoke up, “Mr. Heyer, maybe pretend you’re explaining this to a five-year-old?”

  Heyer nodded. “Malkier is bringing all the gateways on the Feroxian Plane to a single location. These seven arcs making up the outer circle are called Conduit Fields. By arranging the fields around this platform, Cede will be able to open and maintain a massive tunnel connecting the Feroxian Plane to Earth. But, this conduit will not behave like a portal. Time will continue to move forward on the Feroxian Plane.”

  “How many can he bring through at a time?” Jonathan asked.

  “Theoretically he could bring every Ferox on the Feroxian Plane, but there will be a bottleneck as to how fast he can do so. Each Ferox will need to march across the bridge.”

  Jonathan nodded. “They’re going to use portal stones to cross over.”

  Heyer wasn’t sure if it had been a question or a statement. Either way, it surprised him. Jonathan’s words struck directly at the most immediate danger the conduit represented.

  “Yes,” Heyer said, pausing a moment to consider him. “But, unlike the gateways, the conduit will allow them to bring inanimate objects along with them.”

  “How does that work?” Collin asked. “Why does a Ferox need a portal stone but, like, a stick doesn’t?”

  “You are thinking about it the wrong way, the Ferox will not require a stone to cross the conduit,” Heyer said.

  “Then, why bother with them?” Hayden asked.

  Jonathan let out a knowing sigh. “To pull us inside and keep us there.”

  Heyer tilted his head and studied Jonathan again. “Yes, exactly. You’ve grasped this rather quickly.”

  He looked up from the model for the first time and finally noticed that it wasn’t just Heyer. The entire council was looking at him as though he were suddenly a professor of gateway mechanics.

  “It’s a game. Once you know the rules you know the moves your opponent can make. The moment Malkier lost you as a prisoner—he knew the rules had changed drastically in our favor. He knows he must deal with us in The Never. Otherwise any attack on Earth will fail.”

  The group swapped looks again, everyone but Heyer, who still seemed focused on Jonathan. It was Paige who spoke up again. “Um, maybe pretend you’re explaining it to a four-year-old?”

  Heyer didn’t speak. He just stared at Jonathan to hear his explanation.

  “Okay. Don’t look at me like that,” Jonathan said. “I’ve told you, when I was trapped in my queue, we had months to consider how Malkier would come at us. Well, except you, Old Man. You slept the whole time. Helpful.”

  Heyer folded his arms across his chest and slowly sat back in his chair.

  “Still waiting,” Paige said.

  “We control The Never,” Jonathan said. “The only time we don’t, is when we’re pulled into it. The only way Malkier keeps us from using The Never against him, is to pull all of us in at once.”

  “Malkier knows Borealis history far better than I do. He knows that in any conflict where one side controls The Never, the might of an opposing army is damn near irrelevant.”

  “Right,” Sydney said. “Like The Cell trying to hold you prisoner. No matter what they did you’d be ready for it.”

  Jonathan nodded.

  “Just like the gateways, this conduit will be directed at Earth. He knows we won’t let that happen, that we’ll intercept him inside The Never.”

  “I don’t get it, what stops us from doing that anyway?” Leah asked.

  “What do you mean?” Paige asked.

  “Say he draws us into The Never, we fight, and we lose,” Leah said. “Okay, Earth no longer has an army of super soldiers. But mankind still has Mr.
Clean . . . don’t we?”

  Jonathan and Heyer exchanged a look as the AI began to respond, “Unfortunately—”

  “Command Hierarchy,” Jonathan interrupted. “Mr. Clean’s programming only gives him so much leeway. In the end, he obeys orders from whomever is highest in the chain of command. Only a person with a Borealis implant can be in the chain.”

  She noticed the alien had looked anxious as Jonathan explained this. That he seemed relieved when he stopped.

  “Wait, what exactly is the order. The chain of command?”

  “Heyer, then myself,” Jonathan said.

  Leah eyed them curiously. “There is clearly more to it than that. What aren’t you telling us?”

  “That is as much as needs to be known on the matter,” Heyer said, with a warning in his tone.

  She was taken aback by this, but one look at Jonathan warned her to take a hint. While she bit her tongue, she sat back with a look on her face that made Jonathan sigh with knowing.

  Collin, perhaps trying to resolve the tension, cleared his throat. “So, uh, getting back to brass tacks here, you’re saying that if Heyer and The Never Army are taken off the board, Mr. Clean will obey Malkier. At which point, he’s not just invincible, he’ll control The Never.”

  “Yes,” Jonathan said.

  “While it is terrible to imagine,” Heyer said, “the conduit is a much more pressing concern. I have hardly begun to explain the full extent of the bad news.”

  CHAPTER SIXTY-THREE

  “NORMALLY, DESTROYING THE portal stone allows one of our men to exit The Never. This conduit will change that dynamic. Each member of our Army will be pulled into The Never by multiple stones. Breaking any single one will not get them out.”

  “So wait, what will happen if a stone is destroyed?” Paige asked.

  “See the gateway fields,” Heyer said, directed her back to the model turning at the center at the table. “Each stone that accompanies a Ferox through the conduit will still be attuned to a gateway. All Malkier has to do to keep each of our men inside is overload each queue.”