Earthman Jack vs. The Ghost Planet (12 page)

He swung the baton in his right hand low, catching the
Deathlord in his gut.

The next blow went high, the baton crashing into the back of
the Deathlord’s head. 

The strikes from Shepherd’s weapons sent ripples of
electricity coursing through the Deathlord, causing him to cry out in pain.

Gracefully, Shepherd spun, landing both batons in a powerful
blow on the Deathlord’s back.  The Deathlord buckled to his knees and
disintegrated into a puff of black dust.

During the fight, the spire that the other two Deathlords had
activated from the mysterious black box began to charge to life with purple
energy.  Shepherd looked up just in time to see the spire emit a brilliant
flash of purple light.  Suddenly, ten Deathlord soldiers were around the spire,
having just been teleported there without the use of the portgate.

Wasting no time, Shepherd threw himself into the fray. 

His fighting sticks whirled with skilled fury as he rushed
into the thick of the enemy alien force, each blow destroying a Deathlord
Soldier with a single strike.  But even as one soldier fell, two more arrived
from the portgate’s portal, and if Shepherd didn’t act quickly, the transport
spire would recharge and teleport in even more.

Jack squirmed on the ground, covered in dust and a little
blood.  His back screamed from the impact he had received, and his head hurt
from being knocked down.  Jack looked up wearily to see the army of Deathlords
who had just arrived and Shepherd’s frantic attempt to fight them off.

All of a sudden, the situation was too horribly real.  The
pain in Jack’s body alerted him to the idea that this was not a movie, this was
not a game, this was
actually
happening, and if he weren’t careful – he
could really, truly die.

Then, Jack noticed trails of black dust slowly gathering
together on the ground and slithering toward him.  The dust began to form into
the shape of a clawed hand, its taloned fingers crawling on the floor like a
spider’s legs. 

More dust gathered to it, forming an arm with
familiar-looking serrated armored blades.  In sudden horror, Jack realized that
whatever Shepherd had done to that last Deathlord had not actually killed him.

Jack looked over and saw the plasma pistol not far away.  He
reached over and grabbed it, training it on the dust just as it was forming
shoulders and a head.  Red eyes peeked out from the bandages wrapped around the
face the black dust had rematerialized into.

Jack began to fire at the reforming Deathlord who was
quickly crawling toward him.  He fired the weapon repeatedly, sending hot bolts
of red death at the monstrosity.

However, as soon as the blasts passed through the Deathlord,
more dust crawled up to fill the wounds they had left.  The lithe, muscular
demon that was wreaking havoc mere minutes before was coming back to life, and
there was absolutely
nothing
Jack could do to stop it.

“Help!” Jack screamed as he began to crawl backwards from
the steadily gaining alien menace, firing his pistol repeatedly as he did so. 
“Someone, HELP!”

Jack’s blasts were finding their mark now, most likely
because his target was much closer than before.  But other than making the
creature angrier with every shot, the plasma blasts did not seem to be doing
much damage.

The Deathlord was now fully reformed.  He towered over Jack,
and the boy could do nothing but look up in terror as the figure before him
created a ghostly ball of energy in his clawed hand, readying a killing blow. 

Jack braced himself, fear coursing through his veins.

“No!” screamed Jack.  “Don’t!  PLEASE!”

Suddenly, a blue-white baton erupted from the Deathlord’s
chest.  Energy crackled through the alien as it screamed in twisted agony. 

Another baton crashed down on its neck, and the creature
exploded in a puff of dust, this time for good.

Shepherd stood where the evil alien had been moments before,
powerful and terrifying in his own right.  Relief washed over Jack, looking up
at the armored hero who had just saved his life.

Jack’s eyes wandered past Shepherd as more Deathlords
teleported in.  There were now dozens of Dark Soldiers, and Jack realized
Shepherd must have disengaged with them to save his life, leaving the door open
to bring in a bigger force – cutting Jack’s joy at being rescued painfully
short.

The platoon of Deathlord soldiers coming toward them lifted
their rifles, taking aim at Shepherd and him.

“Behind you!” cried Jack.

Shepherd turned as the Deathlords unleashed their first
volley of fire – not purple balls of light this time, but angry red streaks of
plasma. 

Shepherd raised his hand, projecting a large shield wall of
golden light before him.  The blasts hit the shield, which absorbed them.  Jack
marveled at just how awesome Shepherd was.  Not only did he have a suit of
armor with cannons on it, he could do all sorts of ninja moves and create
energy shields!  Suddenly, he felt really guilty for not liking the guy for so
long.

“Jack,” said Shepherd.  “I won’t be able to hold them off
much longer.  We have to get out of here.  Get Green and the Princess.  We’ll
have to fight our way back to the portal and escape.”

The prospect of fighting the Deathlords again did not sit
well with Jack.

“There are so many!” said Jack.  “How will we be able to
fight through them?”

“I’ll clear a path,” said Shepherd.  “But the longer we wait,
the harder it will be.  Get the Princess… NOW.”

Shepherd recalled his quad-cannons and opened a hole in his
shield wall, through which he began to fire at the oncoming Deathlords.

Jack got to his feet and ran down the path toward the
temple.  He gripped his blaster pistol tightly, the weapon being the only thing
that gave him some measure of security in this crazy situation he now found
himself in.

As he got closer to the entrance of the temple, he could see
Anna and Green nearby.  Anna had her back to him, standing before some type of
stone kiosk.  Green was at her side, looking at a small device in his hands.

“Anna!” yelled Jack.  “Professor!  We gotta go!”

Professor Green looked up as Jack approached, smiling like
nothing was going on.  “Ah, Jack!” he said cheerily.  “How goes the battle?”

“Not freakin’ good,” said Jack as he came to a stop at the
Professor’s side.  “Shepherd says we need to get outta here, and I totally
agree.”

“Oh, bother,” said Green, furrowing his brow.  “That could
be a problem…”

“What?  Why?” asked Jack.

Green nodded toward Anna.  Jack looked and saw her standing
before a glowing white orb hovering above the small stone kiosk.  Her hands
were resting on the orb, her eyes open – white and utterly without pupils.

“The Princess is interacting with the Ancient construct,”
said Green.  “She’s been trying to unlock the temple.  If we were to interrupt
her communication with the Ancient device, the sudden disconnect could harm
her.”

Anna stood motionless, as if not able to hear them.  Jack
looked from her to Green and back.  He had no idea what the Professor had just
said, but whatever it was, it didn’t sound terribly convenient. 

Jack looked at the small device the Professor held in his
hand.

“Well, can’t you disconnect her?” Jack asked.  “What’s that
thing do?”

“The Princess is communing with the Ancient interface of
this temple,” explained Green.  “We’ve been working for the better part of a
year to try to decipher the lock on it, with no success.  She was hoping that
with a program I had written to interact with the temple’s database, I might be
able to help her figure out the key to unlocking it, but so far we have found
no trigger with which to do so.  This connection is just a way for me to
monitor the progress of the program.”

Jack glanced back and saw Shepherd firing away at the ever-
encroaching Deathlords.  There was a purple flash in the distance, heralding
the arrival of even more bad guys.

“Professor, we don’t have time for this, we
gotta
go…” said Jack urgently.

Green scrunched up his face like he was thinking through a
physics problem.  “Well,” he said thoughtfully.  “Normally only the Princess
can decide when to sever the connection with Ancient technology; however, we might
be able to close down the connection by attempting to interface with the access
orb ourselves.”

“Great,” said Jack eagerly.  “Let’s do that…”

“Hold on a moment!” said Green.  “Normally, it would be safe
to interact with the Ancient terminal because only those with royal blood are
able to interface with them, but I don’t know what would happen if you were to
try and interrupt the flow of one that’s currently in use.”

“Will it kill me?” asked Jack.

“Well, no, I don’t think so…” replied Green.

“Will they?” asked Jack, pointing to the Deathlords.

Green pondered the oncoming alien army for a moment.  “Most
likely, yes,” he said.

“Sounds safe to me,” said Jack.  And before Green could
speak again, Jack slapped his hand on the glowing orb.

No sooner had Jack placed his hand on the orb than his
muscles tensed up, like an electrical current was running through him. 
Suddenly, he was aware of every part of his body – his organs, his bones, even
his blood cells – as though every part of him was conscious of itself. 

A barrage of images flashed before his eyes.  Strange
numbers, letters, and diagrams seemed to sear themselves into his brain at an
alarming rate.  As they flashed by, Jack was able to make sense of them, but as
new information would come his way, he’d quickly forget whatever it was he’d
just seen.  Before long, the deluge of information became jumbled, and Jack
lost all sense of understanding.

Sounds worked their way in.  He heard a million different
voices whispering to him, saying all types of things he couldn’t comprehend. 
Sometimes they would suddenly switch to English, and then back to bizarre
languages.  And when he
could
understand what was being said, none of it
made any sense.

Then, all the voices began to converge, talking in unison,
just as the images flashing before him began to assemble together, forming into
a mosaic of epic proportions.  The pictures became a solid sphere, rays of
light shining from behind it, and in that sphere floated a single, solitary eye
that looked at Jack as though it were able to see into his very soul.

In one voice, the chorus in his head sang:

“
Eldil Meldilorn
.”

Suddenly, all sensation dissipated, and Jack’s vision came
into focus on a very surprised looking Anna.

“Jack?” she said.  

Jack gazed at her dumbly.  His body shivered, and he
realized his legs were completely numb just before he collapsed onto the
ground.

In moments, Anna and Green were at his side.  Anna had him
in her arms and Green was opening Jack’s eyes wide with his fingers to check
his vital signs.

“Jack, can you hear me?” asked Green.

“What… just… happened?” asked Jack, his head splitting with
the mother of all headaches.

“Well, I’ll be darned,” mused Green.  “It worked!”

“What worked?” asked Anna.  “What did you do?”

“Jack interrupted the flow of data from the access orb so we
could safely disconnect you,” said Green happily.

“No, he didn’t,” said Anna.

Green raised an eyebrow.  “He didn’t?”

“No!” she replied.  “I came out myself after I noticed a
sudden shift in the flow of data from the terminal.”

“Wait a minute…” said Green excitedly.  “Are you telling me
Jack actually
interfaced
with the orb?”

“I did what now?” asked Jack, feeling starting to return to
his body.

“The shift in the flow of data,” said Anna to herself. 
“That would mean… he
unlocked
it!”

Anna and Green shared an amazed glance then turned to Jack
in unison.

“Jack,” said Anna, “What did you see?”

“I don’t know,” said Jack.  “There was so much…”

“Think!” insisted Anna.  “Can you remember anything? 
Anything at all?”

Jack shook his head and said the only thing his over-taxed
brain could remember:

“Eldil Meldilorn?”

Suddenly, there was a low rumble.  The group turned toward
the entrance to the temple.  The door before them was slowly sliding open. 
Jack noticed a symbol on the archway above the door – an orb within an orb.  It
looked almost exactly like the powerful eye he had seen in his vision.

“Great Scott…” mumbled Green.

Jack could feel Anna gripping his shoulder.  He looked up to
see her smiling.

“You did it…” she said, as if she were talking to herself. 
“I was right.  There was a connection!  To think, after all this time, it just
required an Earthman…”

Then, a volley of blaster fire streaked above their heads,
interrupting their moment of success.  They turned and saw Shepherd a few feet
away, still firing through his shield wall at an army of Deathlord soldiers
marching relentlessly their way.

“Inside!” Shepherd yelled.  “Go!  NOW!”

Anna and Green helped Jack to his feet.  His legs still felt
a little rubbery, but nowhere nearly as bad as before.  The three rushed inside
the temple.  By the entrance there was a small panel.  Anna tried making
contact with it, but nothing happened.  She pulled Jack to her.

“Jack, touch this panel,” she said.

Jack did as he was told.  The panel lit up in response.

“Fascinating,” mused Green, as he watched.

“Now, close the door,” said Anna.

“How?” asked Jack.

“Just think about the door closing,” she said.

Jack remembered what the door looked like when it opened,
and tried to picture it going in reverse.  With a creak and a moan, the massive
door began to move.

“Shepherd!” yelled Anna.