The Antithesis- The Complete Pentalogy

by Terra Whiteman

  The moment it did, Leid tackled me with a snarl. I didn’t even hit the ground before she started whaling on me. Her belligerence was almost incoherent. All I heard was ‘monster’ between a chorus of profanity. And I just laid there and took it.

  Ten punches later, the kid stirred. Leid’s fist hovered mid-air as she noticed him.

  Yahweh got to his feet, looking himself over. He swept his hands across his back, searching for a bullet wound. But he wouldn’t find one because I’d used an ink gun. Lucky for me he’d fainted. When he realized he wasn’t mortally wounded, Yahweh stared at me.

  Leid was staring at me, too.

  “I had to make sure it looked real,” I explained. My words were slurred and I leaned to the side, spitting blood. Her fists had felt like cast-iron.

  She slid off me. “That… was probably the cleverest thing you’ve ever done.”

  Yahweh said nothing, still in shock. He collapsed into the closest chair, evidently torn between relief and shame.

  “Commandant,” I called into my radio, “get your jets into position. We’re heading to the Cloak.” Raith hadn’t officially declared war, but his look had been evidence enough. I didn’t know how much time we had but was hoping for at least twenty minutes.

  “Already on that, sir.”

  As Leid spoke to the analysts, I nodded to the notebook in the kid’s hands. “That all you’re going to bring with you?”

  “It’s all I need,” Yahweh said quietly, not looking at me.

  “Come on; I’m taking you home.”

  He got up and followed me into the hall.

  “Qaira, wait,” said Leid.

  I paused as she chased after me. As I turned she reached for my neck and pulled me down into a vicious kiss. Yahweh rolled his eyes, looking away.

  “Be careful,” she whispered against my lips. “Please.”

  “I will. Where are you going to be?”

  “I’m staying here with the analysts. Ara has asked me to delegate between teams on the telecomm.”

  I wasn’t really thrilled with that idea, since Eroqam would be a hotspot—but if anyone was likely to survive a bomb, it was Leid. All I did was nod and cup her face, looking her over one more time. My thumb grazed her bottom lip before I pulled back and headed down the hall, Yahweh close behind. I could feel her eyes on me the entire way.

  As we reached the port, Yahweh said, “Don’t do this, Qaira.”

  “It has to happen,” I said, gesturing for him to enter first. “I’m sorry; I really am.”

  He paused in the entrance, absolution in his gaze. “It won’t end well for you.”

  I smirked. “Nothing ever ends well for anyone.”

  After a second of hesitation, Yahweh was swallowed by the shadows of the hangar deck. I slipped on my mask and followed.

  XXIX

  FALLING SKIES

  IT WAS MIDDAY, AND SANCTUM WAS DEAD SILET.

  Aero-crafts lay abandoned, scattered chaotically in the streets. High-rises were inactive, advertisement billboards still tuned to the evacuation warning, looping silently.

  Above the city, the sky was getting darker. The wind picked up—small gusts at first, amassing into violent torrents that threatened to bend street lamps and rip store signs from the Agora.

  The gravity changed; a slight shift that left a ring in my ears. The sky was growing darker still, but now the darkness was centralized, like mass drifting slowly to an ocean surface. A whistle broke through the wind, and a bright sphere emerged through encircling green and black clouds. It was the size of Sanctum—maybe even larger, shining red light through its porous surface.

  All Eroqam lines were static. The Ark’s appearance had snatched the breath from our lungs. From the Cloak, my men and I watched the angel’s descent in horrified awe. Without my plan, there was no way we could have won. And as certain death grew closer still, the possibility of victory shriveled until I could barely see it anymore.

  The light around the Ark was getting even brighter. The whistle turned into a roar, and then a deafening screech. A symphony of shattering glass occurred around the city as the noise blew out a thousand windows.

  The ship appeared to shudder, growing little spines that came loose and fell toward Sanctum like black raindrops. But then the raindrops started to move, soar.

  Jets.

  Eroqam lines exploded.

  “Detection of level three radiation—”

  “Sanctum Forces, move to the front of the line!”

  “First wave, first wave!”

  “Level four radiation, and climbing! That light is toxic!”

  “Enforcer jets, hold back,” I ordered into the headset coiled around my ear. “Sanctum Forces, move to meet the first wave.” And die.

  The first line roared overhead by the dozens, engines shaking the ground, and the Cloak teetered from their downdraft. They met the Ark’s first wave as they prepared for a full-assault on Eroqam—just as I’d expected—and our sky became an ocean of artillery and fire.

  Our first line didn’t last five minutes, also as I’d expected. But now the angels were cocky and had congregated above Eroqam and the central Agora, ready to blow them to smithereens.

  “Ara, give the command!” I shouted.

  “Enforcer jets, move out! Keep those whites occupied!”

  From around the city our jets rose like hornets at supersonic speed, surrounding the group over Eroqam and executing them in one fell swoop. The artillery and fire intensified, the air filling up with bullet tailsparks and smoke. An enemy jet crashed into Eroqam’s western spire, and giant chunks of coua rained on the port where my team and I waited. A chunk fell dangerously close, rolling several feet away.

  We all were quiet, watching the battle ensue. Except for Yahweh, who shrieked at every explosion and cowered further into the corner. He was seated on the bench with knees drawn to his chest, hands over his ears. Poor kid.

  “Enforcer jets, engage the base ship,” Leid ordered over the command line. “Attack the thin metal cylinders on the underside of the Ark; we need to take out their communication satellites.”

  “Sanctum Forces,” my brother ordered not a second later, “keep the angels busy and cover those Enforcer jets!”

  “Sanctum Forces, bring the fight a little closer to us,” I said, adding my two cents.

  Once the sky was a complete cluster-fuck, I started the engine. Yahweh moaned behind me as we slowly left the port.

  “The Cloak is in the air,” I announced. “Coordinates are 58, 32, 156. Do not attack us.”

  “Your flight coordinates are tracked, Regent,” said Leid. “The Cloak is safe to go.”

  “Get me off!” Yahweh cried, clawing at the walls. “We’re going to die!”

  “Someone shut him up,” I ordered.

  Lt. Geiss forced him back on the bench with a mean look.

  “Keep screaming like that and we will die,” I said. “I need to concentrate.”

  I weaved through the battle, tailing several enemy jets on my way up. As I fired aimlessly at Enforcer jets—missing intentionally—my team assembled their weapons and tugged on their masks. Clicks of knife and scope attachments and clinks of bullets hitting chambers filled the cabin. As we cleared dark water, I switched our feed to enemy lines. Nehelian turned into Archaean as soldiers screamed commands at each other. They sounded scared, and that made me smile.

  Commander Raith’s voice, ever-calm and authoritative, broke through the hysteria. “Front-line units, cease attack on Eroqam and fall back. A Nehelian fleet is attacking our satellites. Crush them.”

  Soon, I thought. Very soon.

  I hadn’t realized how close I was to achieving my goal until now. We were almost at the Ark, the pores along its surface near enough to recognize them as jet docks. The amount of Enforcer jets had already been cut in half. Pretty soon they would all be gone, and then the angels would decimate Sanctum. I had to kill Raith before any of that happened.

  I flew the Cloak into a dock,
continuing down a port tunnel into a dark, terrifying unknown. Tiny white lights guided our path through a narrow cavern of metal beams.

  We were in.

  We were in!

  I had to keep myself from laughing. My team crowded around the pilot seat, watching the alien scenery blur by the windshield. The tunnel opened into a loading dock. I parked the craft between two larger ones—probably carrier units. A crew of angels carried metal crates into one of them. They didn’t even notice us pulling in.

  I turned off the engine and opened the hatch. The ramp descended slowly, creating a bridge to the dock. As I left the pilot seat and moved to the exit, my team awaiting orders, I pointed at Yahweh, still curled on the bench.

  “Stay here.”

  He didn’t reply but he didn’t budge either, so I assumed he got the message. I motioned for my team to follow behind me in single file, and together we marched down the ramp.

  The angels noticed us, finally. But it was far too late for them now.

  Two of them dropped their crates and made a break for the door. Lt. Geiss and Samay shot them and they fell simultaneously with oozing holes in their heads.

  Two more had the courage to reach for their side arms. They, too, fell a second later.

  All that was left was a lone angel, backing away over a growing pool of his comrades’ blood, holding up his hands in surrender.

  My team stayed at the dock’s edge as I followed the angel through the blood and bodies, leaving crimson footprints across the cement. He tried to run but I snatched him by the uniform and lifted him off his feet by his neck. He was young—maybe a little older than Yahweh. That was unfortunate.

  “Where can I find Commander Raith?” I asked, pulling him inches from my mask—so close that the red light of my eyes cast a glow across his terrified face.

  “The command station,” he stammered, choking.

  When I didn’t respond, the angel pointed to the door on the right side of the loading dock. “D-Down a mile, then a left. T-There’s an elevator that w-will lead you to the Aerial deck.”

  “Thank you,” I said.

  The boy’s eyes widened and he opened his mouth to scream. Before he could, his head exploded all over me. I wiped brain and bone fragments from my mask, throwing the corpse aside. I hadn’t wanted to kill that angel but I couldn’t risk him alerting the soldiers. Instead I’d given him an instant, painless death. For the most part.

  I returned to the Cloak and dialed Eroqam a final time.

  “Advisor Koseling, this is Regent Qaira Eltruan.” I was being so formal because there were other CAs in the communications room who might have been listening in. “We are on the Ark. This will be the last transmission you will receive, as my team and I are leaving the Cloak and will not attempt to contact you again in fear of alerting enemy satellites of our location.”

  “Will you contact us after you’ve executed Commander Raith?”

  “Yes. Until then, make sure my brother and our forces hit the angels with everything they’ve got. We need to keep them distracted.”

  “Three of their satellites have been taken out, so we’ve bought ourselves some time. Be careful, Regent.”

  “I will, over.”

  I severed the call and turned to the kid. He was staring at all the blood on my suit. “Let’s go.”

  Yahweh got to his feet and I ushered him down the dock. He froze on the deck, looking over the bodies. A pool of blood almost touched his shoes, and he stumbled backward into me.

  I shoved him forward. “Go on.”

  “Where?”

  “Wherever. This is the end of the line.”

  “You…you’re just going to let me go?”

  “I’m going to count to thirty. If you’re still here I’m going to shoot you, and it won’t be with an ink bullet this time.”

  Yahweh took another step, wearing an incredulous frown. “Aren’t you worried that I’ll alert my father?”

  “If you alert your father, I’m going to die. If you don’t alert your father, he’s going to die. I know I’ve put you in a tough situation, but that’s how it has to be.”

  He looked away, conflicted.

  “But if you alert Commander Raith, a lot more people are going to die than him. I’ll have to kill everyone that gets in my way, and you would be responsible for that.”

  “Can you promise that no harm will come to any of our unarmed civilians?”

  “I can’t promise that, no. But I can definitely try not to harm them. When or if you claim any sort of power, you need to convince your people to leave The Atrium.”

  After a moment of hesitation, he nodded. “Fine.”

  “Now get out of here. Thirty, twenty-nine, twenty-eight…”

  I raised my rifle and Yahweh bolted for the door on the left—the one that led away from the command station. I stopped counting when he disappeared. Lowering my rifle, I whispered, “Goodbye.”

  And then my men surrounded me. I nodded to the door on the right.

  “Let’s go. Keep a twelve-foot distance behind me at all times.”

  XXX

  SYMPHONY OF MACHINES

  WE REACHED THE ELEVATOR, FIFTY soldiers later. Luckily for us most of them had been taken by surprise and were dead before they could return fire. The ones who had heard the rifles weren’t as surprised to see us, but we’d handled them too. My team had left most of them to me since we had to move as quietly and quickly as possible.

  I fumbled with the elevator keypad, leaving red smears across the buttons. My suit was covered in blood and gore. I’d lost two of my men already, whom had caught bullets in crossfire. I was also pretty sure a bullet had grazed my right arm, because it was kind of sore. There was no blood that I could tell, so it wasn’t serious.

  The elevator flashed a red light every time I pressed a button, and a message on the screen above the doors asked for a card key. I didn’t have a card key.

  “Fuck,” I muttered, retracing my steps.

  “What’s wrong, sir?” asked Lt. Fedaz.

  “We need a card to open that door. Cover me; I need to check some of those bodies.”

  I could feel my heart in my ears as the element of time slipped from my grasp. We had to hurry. Eventually someone would alert Raith and then we would be trapped down here. I wasn’t panicking yet, but my body was certainly gearing up for it.

  I returned to the bloodbath of twelve headless angels in the east corridor, rifling through their suits in hope that they had a card. My men knelt and covered me from both directions, guns pointed at each tunnel bend should an enemy try to surprise us.

  And then I found the card. It was around a soldier’s neck, held by a chain and drenched in blood. Hopefully it wasn’t ruined.

  We returned to the elevator and I swiped the card through a thin rectangular slot. Another red light flashed above it and a message appeared on the screen again:

  PLEASE SLIDE CARD OTHER WAY

  “Oh for fuck’s sake,” I breathed, flipping it around. A green light and awful bell-like music filled the hallway and we spun, pointing our guns down it. The doors slid open and we backed into the elevator. I pressed another button and the door closed.

  Ding.

  Next stop, the bridge.

  ***

  My men and I weaved through a maze of glass hallways—empty, thankfully—which gave us a scenic view of all the lower and upper floors, wrapping around the Ark like rings on a planet. As much as I hated the angels, I couldn’t deny the stunning quality of their technology. The hallways led upward, like a ramp. Faint alarms blared from somewhere, and automated voice messages ordering soldiers to report to the hangar played on loop. My plan had worked; they were too busy vacating their ship to protect it.

  The sound of voices made us back up a step. Someone was coming down the ramp. We receded to the closest bend, and I motioned for my men to back away as far as they could. The voices grew louder.

  Female. Laughter.

  I could see them through the
wall. Two angel girls dressed in cadet uniforms, chatting informally like a war wasn’t going on. Even though I was in clear sight, they didn’t even notice me, too busy discussing rumors about a boy in Aviations.

  Their stupid conversation came to a halt when they rounded the bend and their heads exploded simultaneously, splattering the glass with pink and red mist. We all took a moment to look at them, and then pressed on.

  I’d found that display to be a little insulting—that was how serious they were about this war. That was how serious they were about us.

  But that all would change very soon.

  The glass hallways came to a very abrupt end at a narrow corridor, guarded by two Archaean soldiers. Their uniforms were different than the others—these ones had rank. White and navy painted plate, visors hiding their faces. Undoubtedly, they were the only things between me and the command station.

  They saw us and pulled out their guns, aiming them at me. I froze and held up my hands. I was smiling, but they couldn’t see that.

  The one on the left reached for their radio, but Lt. Geiss shot it out of their hand. They’d only seen me first, as my men had yet to leave the glass hall. Now there were twelve of us, and those angels weren’t so brave anymore.

  With our weapons pointed back at them, the one on the left shoved the one on the right behind him in a protective stance. Judging by their heights alone, the one in front was male, while the one behind was female.

  I took another step across the bridge. The male shook his gun at me.

  “Move another inch and I’ll blow your head off,” he warned.

  “If you kill me, you and your partner will be next to die,” I said, gesturing to my men.

  After a calculated moment of silence, the male said, “Cereli, get out of here.”

  “I’m not leaving you,” said the female.

  “I said get out of here!”

  “I won’t!”

  I watched their exchange with an arched brow. “How about I let you both walk away if you give me the card to open that door?”